Environmental Challenges in the Residential Sector: Life Cycle Assessment of Mexican Social Housing

Diana Carolina Gámez-García, Héctor Saldaña-Márquez, José Manuel Gómez-Soberón, Susana Paola Arredondo-Rea, María Consolación Gómez-Soberón and Ramón Corral-Higuera
Additional contact information
Diana Carolina Gámez-García: Barcelona School of Architecture, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, 649 Diagonal Avenue, 08028 Barcelona, Spain
Héctor Saldaña-Márquez: Barcelona School of Architecture, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, 649 Diagonal Avenue, 08028 Barcelona, Spain
José Manuel Gómez-Soberón: Barcelona School of Building Construction, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, 44-50 Doctor Marañón Avenue, 08028 Barcelona, Spain
Susana Paola Arredondo-Rea: Mochis Faculty of Engineering, Autonomous University of Sinaloa, no number Fuente de Poseidón y Ángel Flores, Los Mochis 81210, Mexico
María Consolación Gómez-Soberón: Civil Engineering School, Metropolitan Autonomous University. Av. San Pablo 180, Mexico City 02200, Mexico
Ramón Corral-Higuera: Mochis Faculty of Engineering, Autonomous University of Sinaloa, no number Fuente de Poseidón y Ángel Flores, Los Mochis 81210, Mexico

Energies, 2019, vol. 12, issue 14, 1-24

Abstract: Social Housing (SH) in Mexico has a potentially important role in reducing both the emission of greenhouse gases and the use of non-renewable resources, two of the main challenges facing not only Mexico but the planet as a whole. This work assesses the environmental impact generated by the embodied stages of a typical SH throughout its life cycle (cradle to grave), by means of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Two types of envelope and interior walls and three types of windows are compared. It was found that SH emits 309 kg CO 2 eq/m 2 and consumes 3911 MJ eq/m 2 in the product stages (A1 to A3) and construction process (A4 to A5); the most important stages are those referring to the products, namely, A1 to A3, B4 (replacement) and B2 (maintenance). Additionally, benefits were found in the use of lightweight and thermal materials, such as concrete blocks lightened with pumice or windows made of PVC or wood. Although the use of LCA is incipient in the housing and construction sector in Mexico, this work shows how its application is not only feasible but recommended as it may become a basic tool in the search for sustainability.

Keywords: life cycle assessment; social housing; embodied stages; embodied energy; embodied greenhouse gases; residential sector; Latin America and the Caribbean (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/14/2837/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/14/2837/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:12:y:2019:i:14:p:2837-:d:250955

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().