Life Cycle Risk Assessment Applied to Gaseous Emissions from Crumb Rubber Asphalt Pavement Construction

Maria Chiara Zanetti and Angela Farina
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Maria Chiara Zanetti: DIATI—Department of Environment, Land and Infrastructure Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, Corso Duca degli Abruzzi 24, 10129 Torino, Italy
Angela Farina: DIATI—Department of Environment, Land and Infrastructure Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, Corso Duca degli Abruzzi 24, 10129 Torino, Italy

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 9, 1-12

Abstract: Asphalt mixtures for road pavements are produced and laid at high temperatures, producing gaseous emissions that contain polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and volatile organic compounds that paving workers are exposed to. This paper aims to combine the effects of gaseous emissions on human health with the life cycle impacts of wearing courses. The results of sanitary-environmental risk analysis and life cycle assessment were combined in an integrated approach, the life cycle risk analysis, to evaluate the environmental performance of road pavements and local cancer and toxicological effects on workers. Two asphalt mixtures modified with crumb rubber (CR) from end-of-life tires (gap and dense graded) were compared to standard, unmodified asphalt mix. Air samples were collected at the screed and the driver’s seat of a paver during the construction of a full-scale trial section in Turin, Italy. The CR wearing course with a higher asphalt binder content (gap-graded) had a cancer effect on workers 3.5 and 2.9 times higher than the CR mixture with a lower asphalt binder percentage (dense-graded) and the standard mixture, respectively. Instead, the toxicological effects were 1.3 and 1.2 times higher for the gap-graded mixture than the dense-graded and the standard mix, respectively.

Keywords: life cycle assessment; sanitary-environmental risk assessment; life cycle risk assessment; road pavements; gaseous emissions; crumb rubber (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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