Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

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Journal of Environmental Management

journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jenvman

Research article

Environmental footprint of a road pavement rehabilitation service in Spain

Daniel Garraín *, Yolanda Lecho
�n
CIEMAT, Energy Department, Energy Systems Analysis Unit, Madrid, Spain

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Road surfaces are subject to wear and tear due to materials ageing, weathering and the action of road traffic.
Spanish road Periodic rehabilitation or reconstruction is needed in order to restore them. This manuscript presents an envi­
Reclaimed asphalt pavement ronmental assessment of a traditional road pavement rehabilitation technique (with hot mix asphalt) in Spain by
Environmental footprint
means of a life cycle approach. The environmental footprint method was selected for presenting the results,
Life cycle assessment
Rehabilitation
which have a similar range as those obtained in earlier studies. Extraction of raw materials and the
Hot mixed asphalt manufacturing of processed materials are the stages with the most environmental impacts. Therefore, the use of
recycled asphalts in an adequate percentage is advisable for reducing the total environmental impact. This is the
first complete study carried out in Spain. Its results could be used as a baseline for comparison with both newer
restoration techniques and the use of advanced materials in the country.

The choice of the appropriate technique can have important envi­

1. Introduction
The European road and motorways network has a length of
approximately five million kilometres, and close to 90% of its pavements
are made of asphalt mixtures. This wide system of pavements requires a
large amount of economic, energy and human resources in order to carry
out appropriate maintenance and rehabilitation operations. Approxi­
mately half of the average budget for construction in the European
public administrations is used in rehabilitation and maintenance oper­
ations of existing asphalt pavements (ERF, 2017).
The average road surface’s life-time is between 20 and 30 years. The
deterioration period depends on several key factors: on the one hand,
those directly related to the structural design, the construction process
or the number of planned rehabilitation and maintenance operations
during its useful life; on the other hand, those linked to the traffic (in­
tensity, type, loads, speed, etc.) or to environmental aspects (tempera­
ture variations, rain, snow, frost, salt, solar radiation, oxidation
processes of binders, etc.).
Therefore, the main objectives of the rehabilitation and maintenance
operations are both the preservation of the asphalt road in optimum
conditions in order to guarantee safe circulation of road users, and the
saving costs that a total road reconstruction would entail. Several
techniques for repairing roads are used to extend their life-spans, from
traditional asphalt overlays or reconstruction to more up-to-date
methods which use recycled materials either cold or hot, either in-
plant or in-place (in situ).
ronmental sustainability implications. Many studies related to road
construction and rehabilitation techniques analyse the environmental
impacts using a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) (AzariJafari et al., 2016;
Santero et al., 2011b, 2011c) approach. LCA methodology accounts for
burdens in material production, manufacturing, use, and end-of-life
stages, and adds them together to estimate impacts over the full life
cycle of a product or process (Buchanan et al., 2018). Using LCA (Jullien
et al., 2014) demonstrated the importance of the maintenance stage
when is compared to road construction. The use of LCA in civil engi­
neering dates back to the 1990s, nevertheless performing rigorous LCA
remains a tedious and costly task and the implementation in a systematic
way at project level is sometimes unfeasible (Schlegel et al., 2016). Up to
this day, several reviews of LCAs of roads have been compiled in the
literature (AzariJafari et al., 2016; Balaguera et al., 2018; Inyim et al.,
2016; Paulo et al., 2014; Santero et al., 2011c, 2011b; 2011a; Ventura
and Jullien, 2014; Zaumanis et al., 2014). These reviews confirm the
lack of environmental studies in Spain, with the exception of (Vidal
et al., 2007), which highlighted the importance of the construction
phase when some pollutants (namely carbon dioxide and sulphur di­
oxide) are considered in the entire life cycle of secondary roads, and
(Vidal et al., 2013), which performed a comprehensive LCA of asphalt
pavements with different materials. As for the different road rehabili­
tation techniques, several specific LCA studies have been published.
Most of them identify the use of recycled or reused materials, as
Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement (RAP) (Aurangzeb et al., 2014; Celauro
et al., 2015; Chiu et al., 2008; Dinis-Almeida et al., 2016; Huang et al.,

* Corresponding author. Av. Complutense 40, E28040, Madrid, Spain.

E-mail address: daniel.garrain@ciemat.es (D. Garraín).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2019.109646
Received 15 March 2019; Received in revised form 23 September 2019; Accepted 26 September 2019
Available online 1 October 2019
0301-4797/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on
Nomenclature
AC Asphalt Cement
BBTM B�eton Bitumineux Tr�es Mince (Very Thin Bituminous
Concrete)
CC Climate Change
EC European Commission
EF Environmental Footprint
EU Eutrophication
FEC Freshwater Ecotoxicity
GHG Greenhouse Gases
HM Hormig� on Masa (Mass Concrete)
HMA Hot Mix Asphalt
HT Human Toxicity
ILCD International Life-Cycle Data-System
2009, 2007; Miliutenko et al., 2013; Pradyumna et al., 2013), and the
new techniques, as cold-in-place-recycling, as the preferred options for
reducing the environmental impact when compared to traditional
methods. For example (Turk et al., 2016), made a comparison of tradi­
tional and cold-in-place-recycling techniques in Slovenia, where the
latter could decrease the environmental impact by around 15–18%
across several impact categories, such as acidification, abiotic depletion
and energy consumption (Santos et al., 2017). showed –by means of a
Life Cycle Cost –LCC- analysis–that in-place recycling practices are
beneficial not only from an environmental point of view, but also
economically advantageous for both highway agencies and road users.
Finally (Giani et al., 2015), showed that the application of RAP by means
of cold-in-place could decrease the use of aggregates, transport and the
energy consumption of the bitumen manufacturing plant. Moreover, in
terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission savings, these reductions could
range from 9% to more than 50% if the recycling stage is considered.
Nevertheless it is important to consider that the final mixture has to
perform the same quality and mechanical properties under standards.
Spanish legislation considers a range from 15 to 80% of RAP in roads
depending of different types and uses, but it has to accomplish the
standards about tolerances on granulometry, binder contents, and
binder infiltration, among others (Ministry of Civil Works, 2017).
This study presents an environmental assessment of a traditional
road pavement rehabilitation technique in Spain by means of the
Environmental Footprint (EF) calculation, that is to say, an LCA
approach where the impact categories come already defined. Main data
have been obtained from an unpublished technical report which con­
tains the whole details of the rehabilitation project (García-Anguera,
2015).
2. Materials and methods
LCA is a tool for estimating and quantifying potential environmental
impacts of products, processes and services throughout their entire life
cycle, from raw material extraction through transport, manufacturing,
use and the end of life. International norms for conducting LCA are
published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO,
2006). LCA is carried out in four phases that are generally interrelated:
i) Definition of goal and scope: The LCA begins with the declaration
of the objectives and scope of the study, which includes the way
in which the results are intended to be communicated. The
objective and scope should be consistent with the intended
application of the LCA and include technical information, such as
the functional unit (i.e. a measure of the function of the studied
system which acts as a reference for the calculation of system
2
Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646
IR Ionizing Radiation
ISO International Organization for Standardization
LCA Life Cycle Assessment
LCI Life Cycle Inventory
LCIA Life Cycle Impact Assessment
LU Land Use
MFR Mineral, Fossil and Renewable Resource Depletion
OD Ozone Depletion
PM Particulate Matter
PMB Polymer Modified Bitumen
POF Photochemical Ozone Formation
RAP Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement
SBS Styrene-Butadiene-Styrene
SWU Scarcity Water Units
WRD Water Resource Depletion
inputs, outputs and its corresponding impacts) or the definition of
system boundaries and the assumptions used.
ii) Life Cycle Inventory (LCI): It consists of detailed tracking of all the
flows in and out of all the process stages in the entire life cycle.
These data refer to the previously defined functional unit.
iii) Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA): This phase seeks to evaluate
the potential significance of the impacts based on the results of
the inventory by means of the classification into impact
categories.
iv) Interpretation of the results: The interpretation of the life cycle is a
systematic technique for identifying, checking and evaluating the
information obtained from inventory results and/or of the LCIA.
This phase may include elements such as integrity or sensitivity
analysis, and the preparation of conclusions or recommendations.
In view of the diversity of existing methodological approaches, the
European Commission (EC) tried to unify them by developing a method
to quantify and characterize environmental impacts, called Environ­
mental Footprint (EF). The focus of the LCA and the EF and the phases of
the assessment are the same, also the factors and the elaboration pro­
cess. The main difference is that the impact categories are already
defined in EF. The main objective of an EF analysis is, firstly, to collect
the inputs and outputs from inventory data according to their contri­
butions to each potential impact category. This provides a basis to
analyse the results in relation to the goals and scope of the study (e.g.,
identification of ‘hotspots’ and definition of ‘options’ for improving the
environmental profile) (EC, 2013).
Concerning the third phase, EF uses different models in order to
quantify the relationships between inputs and outputs (energy, mate­
rials and emissions) associated to products or processes and the
respective impact category. Then, each category refers to a different and
independent impact assessment model. The fifteen selected categories
are the following: climate change [CC], ozone depletion [OD], human
toxicity (cancer [HTc] and non-cancer effects [HTnc]), particulate matter
[PM], ionizing radiation human health [IRhh], photochemical ozone
formation [POF], acidification [AC], eutrophication (terrestrial [EUt],
freshwater [EUf] and marine [EUm]), freshwater ecotoxicity [FEC], land
use [LU], water resource depletion [WRD], and mineral, fossil and
renewable resource depletion [MFR] (Benini et al., 2014; EC, 2013;
Manfredi et al., 2012).
2.1. Goal and scope
The specific objective of this work is the estimation of the potential
environmental impacts of a traditional rehabilitation process of the A-62
road located in the province of Valladolid (Spain), from kilometre points
100.8 to 117.8, by means of the EF calculation.
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on
According to the ISO 14040 standard (ISO, 2006), the road reha­
bilitation process system was defined as the set of elementary flows
which perform one or more functions, and which serve as a model for the
LCA conception. Then, the process system of the study was divided into a
series of unitary processes, linked together through intermediate pro­
cesses, either with other product systems or with the environment
through elementary flows, as shown in Fig. 1. Regarding the acronyms of
asphalt layers, HMA is Hot Mix Asphalt; AC22 or AC16 means Asphalt
Cement and the maximum gravel size; base/bin/surf means if the
mixture is going to be used in the base, intermediate or surface layer; S
indicates the granulometry (medium in this case); R25 refers to the
percentage of RAP (25%); BBTM come from the French term ‘B�eton
Bitumineux Tr�es Mince’ (Very Thin Bituminous Concrete); and 11B in­
dicates the maximum gravel size and the type.
The unit of analysis, or functional unit, must be referred to the
rehabilitated area. The different works carried out on the road given the
different road types have been considered. The technical specifications
of each part of the road are as follows:
i) Road: 17,000 m with an average width of 7 m. The result gives an
area of 119,000 square meters.
ii) Service roads: 6295 square meters.
iii) Expansion of the central reservation lane: 371 square meters.
The total rehabilitated area considered was 125,666 square meters.
Inventory data refer to this amount, and the final results refer to 1
rehabilitated square meter (which is the functional unit).
Regarding the system boundaries (described in detail in section 2.2),
the following main processes were included:
� Raw materials extraction,
� Transport of these materials to the construction site or the materials’
production plants,
� Bitumen, water and asphalt mixtures manufacturing and their dis­
tribution to the construction site,
� Waste management.
The following operations were excluded: extraction and analysis of
pavement samples, signalling, beaconing, replacement of equipment
(gauging stations, meteorological sensors, etc.), cleaning after the
application of the rolling layers, subsequent maintenance operations,
and end-of-life scenarios. These processes have been excluded because
of there are exactly the same as those carried out when a new road is
constructed. Because this rehabilitation technique is willing to be a
standard to be compared to other most developed techniques or even the
construction of a new road, the processes above cited would be the same.
Table 1 describes each considered life-cycle stage in a matrix-format.
2.2. Data inventory
LCI stage is presented below following the consecutive stages of
Table 1, from the milling process to the application of the rolling layer.
Data of energy/material consumptions and machinery operation hours
were directly sourced from the project specifications (García-Anguera,
2015). Nevertheless, other data sources were also consulted in order to
define the inputs and outputs of each process. It is important to remark
that the majority of products and processes were adapted from the de­
faults that the ecoinvent v3.31 database provides.
Fig. 2 shows a schematic cross-section of the road and the services
roads before, during and after the rehabilitation processes, regarding the
type and depths of each layer.
1
www.ecoinvent.org.
3
Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646
2.2.1. Milling
The excavation of the existing pavement allows removing the dete­
riorated parts of the pavement without modifying those that are in good
condition. This process was performed with a 7 cm depth across the
entire width of the road. In a very few specific areas where the need for a
deeper milling was identified, depths of 9 cm were milled. The branches
of the junctions were also treated with a milling depth of 5 cm. A total
volume of 10,066.84 m3 of material was removed. Regarding the
generated waste, the mass of material coming from the milling operation
was 14,095.58 tonnes (average density of 1.4 t/m3). This material is
reused as RAP in the manufacturing of HMA AC22 base S R25 bitumi­
nous layer (see 2.2.6), so an additional waste treatment in landfill is not
required. Thus, only the transportation to the landfill, as temporary
storage, was taken into account. Table 2 presents the data inventory.
2.2.2. Demolition
This process entails the demolition of the road surface only in the
service roads. An excavation of 25 cm was done on both sides before the
application of the reinforcement of concrete (see 2.2.5) and the bitu­
minous mixture AC16 surf S (see 2.2.6). A total area of 6295 m2 was
considered. Regarding the generated waste, two types were distin­
guished: i) A bituminous mixture material whose weight was 1447.85 t,
considering the total area with a rate of 0.1 m3/m2, and an average
density of 2.3 t/m3, and ii) a granular material whose weight was
1416.37 t, considering the total area with a rate of 0.15 m3/m2, and an
average density of 1.5 t/m3 (García-Anguera, 2015). There are different
recycling alternatives according to the material characteristics (Gar­
cía-Anguera, 2015). The following scenarios were considered: i) the
granular material could be suitable for using as gravel, embankment or
backfill (since this material was going to be reused, it was not considered
waste), and ii) the bituminous mix was considered as non-reusable inert
material, so it was considered as landfill waste and its management was
included in the assessment. Table 3 shows the final inventory.
2.2.3. Chip-sealing
The sealing was applied to the cracks and crevices produced by the
retraction of the lower layers of cement gravel before the application of
the reinforcement layer. A total length of 8698.7 m was considered.
Table 4 presents the data inventory of this process.
2.2.4. Prime and tack coating
Coatings are usually applied to provide protection and sealing
against the actions of traffic and weather, while ensuring sufficient
surface texture to provide skid resistance. One prime and two tack
coatings were laid down in the rehabilitation process. The following
sections explain each material data collection in detail.
a) Prime coating: It was placed in service roads after the demolition
process and before the concrete layer. A total amount of 6.67 t of
coating was applied.
b) First tack coating: It was placed in road after the milling process and
before the intermediate asphalt courses HMA AC22. A total amount
of 66.48 t of coating was applied.
c) Second tack coating: This was placed in road after the intermediates
asphalt layers and before the final bituminous with polymers layer
HMA BBTM. A total amount of 252.82 t of coating was applied.
Table 5 shows the data collection for each coating, while Table 6
presents the inventory of the process to manufacture each emulsion
using actual data from (Moral, 2016).
2.2.5. Concrete courses placing
Concrete pavement placing is an increasingly used technique due its
technical, economic and ecological qualities for optimal solutions in
road rehabilitation processes. Two layers of concrete were implemented
on the service roads, with a total volume of 1332.2 m3. The specific type
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

Fig. 1. Flow diagram of considered processes in road rehabilitation.

Table 1
Life cycle stages including the considered processes.
Subsystems Life cycle stages

Extraction of raw materials Transport of raw materials Manufacturing processes Placing of courses End of life
and distribution

Milling – – – Energy consumption of Transport of waste

machinery. to landfill.
RAP recycling.
Demolition – – – Energy consumption of Transport of waste
machinery. to landfill.
Waste
management.
Chip-sealing Extraction of gravel and sand. – – Energy consumption of –
machinery. Transport to work
site.
Prime and task Extraction of gravel and other – Manufacturing of coatings. Energy consumption of –
coating components. machinery. Transport to work
site.
Concrete Extraction of gravel, sand, cements – Manufacturing of concrete Energy consumption of –
placing materials, water and chemical (internal transports included). machinery Transport to work
agents. site.
Asphalts Extraction of gravel, sand and Transport of crude oil to Manufacturing of bitumen and Energy consumption of –
placing cements materials. refinery. asphalt mixtures. machinery.
Transport of gravel,
cement and bitumen to
plant.
Transport to work site.

of concrete (HM-20/B/20/I) has the following composition; Cement II-
32.5, 300 kg; Sand, 960 kg; Gravel, 1050 kg; Water, 180 kg; and fluid­
izing agents, 3 kg (García-Anguera, 2015). Table 7 presents the in­
ventory data, including the batching plant to produce concrete.
2.2.6. Asphalt wearing courses placing
Asphalt wearing courses are usually bituminous mixtures of
hydrocarbon binders (asphalt or polymer modified bitumen –PMB-),
aggregates, and additives, so the whole aggregate particles are covered
by a homogeneous binder film. This energy-intensive process is carried
out in asphalt plants. In the case study, four different HMA were used.
Each type has different intrinsic properties which depend of the specific
application area.

4
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

Fig. 2. Cross-section of the rehabilitation technique to the road and the services roads.

Table 2 Table 6
Data inventory of milling process (García-Anguera, 2015). Data inventory of emulsions manufacturing, by tonne (Moral, 2016).
Item Unit Total Item Unit Prime First Second
tack tack
Diesel consumption of milling machine MJ 1700,849
Diesel consumption of sweeping machine MJ 216,472 Bitumen 50/70a kg 420 600 –
Transport of waste to temporary storage tkm 85,568 Bitumen with polymers PMBa kg – – 600
Water Kg 473 386 325
Chemical agents kg 107 14 75
Electricity consumption kWh 882 883 816
Table 3 Diesel consumption of bitumen l 135 114 84
Data inventory of demolition process (García-Anguera, 2015). heating
Diesel consumption of water heating l 54 57 84
Item Unit Total
a
See section 2.2.7.
Diesel consumption of hydraulic hammer MJ 9669
Diesel consumption of cutting machine MJ 9669
Diesel consumption of truck to landfill and temporary storage MJ 290,066
Waste management t 1447.85 Table 7
Data inventory of concrete pavement application (García-Anguera, 2015).
Item Unit Total
Table 4 Concrete batching plant m3 1332.2
Data inventory of chip-sealing process (García-Anguera, 2015). Diesel consumption of concrete mixer truck MJ 293,851
Cement kg 399,960
Item Unit Total
Sand kg 1,279,872
Electric consumption of crack sealing machine kWh 139 Gravel kg 1,399,860
Electric consumption of compressor kWh 139 Water kg 239,976
Electric consumption of boiler kWh 16,186 Fluidizing agents kg 4000
Diesel consumption of auxiliary vehicle MJ 4008
Mastic asphalt kg 3044.54
Sand and gravel kg 1304.80 a) HMA AC22 base S R25: This layer applied to the road surface after the
first tack coating. A 22.4% of RAP from milling was included in the
total amount of 1386.6 t of asphalt.
Table 5 b) HMA AC22 bin S: This layer was also applied to the road surface after
Data inventory of prime and task coating applications (García-Anguera, 2015). the first tack coating. A total amount of 21,190 t of asphalt was
Item Unit Prime First Second applied.
tack tack c) HMA AC16 surf S: This specific asphalt mixture was placed both on
Diesel consumption of sweeping MJ 45 447 1699
the service roads after the concrete and on the bridge decks of the
machine road. Then two different LCIs were compiled. A total amount of
Diesel consumption of tanker truck MJ 192 1915 7281 13,158.8 and 226.8 t were applied in service roads and bridge decks,
Emulsiona t 6.33 63.16 – respectively.
Sand and gravelb t 0.34 3.32
d) HMA BBTM 11B: Finally, this polymeric asphalt course was applied
–
Emulsion with polymers PMBa t – – 252.82
along the whole road, including the service roads. A total amount of
a
See Table 6. 26,450.8 t was applied.
b
Addition of 5% of sand and gravel.

5
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Table 8 shows the data collection for each HMA, while Table 9 Table 9
presents the inventory of the process to manufacture each one in the Data inventory of HMA plants manufacturing processes, by tonne (Moral, 2016).
asphalt plant from actual data from (Moral, 2016). Item Unit AC22 AC16 BBTM 11B

Electricity for gravel shifting kWh 0.54 0.54 0.54

2.2.7. Bitumen manufacturing Electricity for gravel drying kWh 1.27 1.26 1.26
Two types of bitumen were considered, namely bitumen 50/70 and Natural gas for gravel drying m3 5.99 5.93 5.92
PMB. Bitumen PMB is obtained from the addition of polymers to tradi­ Electricity for bitumen tempering kWh 0.34 0.42 0.43
tional bitumen. Four main stages have been considered to manufacture Diesel for bitumen tempering l 0.21 0.27 0.28
Electricity for mixing kWh 1.89 1.89 1.89
the bitumen 50/70: crude extraction, transport to refinery, crude
refining, and bitumen storage. Additionally, one stage of mixing was
considered for PMB.
Table 10
Crude oil origin and weighted average percentage considered (Garraín et al.,
2.2.7.1. Crude oil extraction and transport to refinery. Crude oil imported
2012, 2014).
into Spain comes from different parts of the world. In this case, average
data on the country of origin of crude oil from two Spanish refineries was Origin Inland refinery (%) Coastal refinery (%) Average (%)

considered from (Garraín et al., 2014, 2012). Table 10 presents the America 26.12 16.41 22.71
weighted average percentage, considering a production of de 7,293,386 Middle East 44.64 39.43 42.81
Russia 7.26 0.92 5.03
and 3,949,189 tonnes for an inland and a coastal refinery, respectively.
Norway 4.10 2.10 3.40
Table 11 shows the distance to coastal refinery from crude oil origin by Rest of Africa 11.65 37.81 20.84
oceanic tanker. United Kingdom 4.99 2.28 4.04
Thus, a value of 7033.63 tkm by tonne of crude oil was calculated for Nigeria 1.24 1.06 1.18
this transportation stage. An additional consumption of 6050 kWh per
tonne of crude oil was considered for inland transportation through an
oil pipeline (REPSOL, 2015). Table 11
Distance to coastal refinery in Spain (Cartagena) (www.searates.com).
2.2.7.2. Crude oil refining. Refining crude oil in a refinery is usually a Origin Country Port Distance (km)
complex multiproduct process. Inventory data for this case were those
America Mexico Altamira 9473.38
provided by bitumen 50/70 manufacturers (technical staff) from the Brazil Santos 8618.02
inland refinery. Inventory data are shown in Table 12. An energy allo­ Middle East Saud Arabia Jubail 9105.66
cation method was applied to refer the data to a tonne of bitumen Iran Bandar Khomeini 9330.75
produced. Specific allocation factors are treated confidentially. Iraq Khorramshahr 9394.46
Tunis Tunis 1085.09
Emirates Jebel Ali 8602.08
2.2.7.3. Bitumen storage. Once the bitumen is produced, it is transferred Russia Russia Novorossiysk 3801.60
through pipes to storage tanks. Inventory data were taken from (Euro­ Norway Norway Oslo 3892.06
bitume, 2012) for a European average refinery. Table 13 shows the in­ Rest of Africa Guinea Conakri 3974.75
Angola Luanda 7646.28
ventory data considered for the storage of one tonne of bitumen.
Libia Bhengazi 2090.02
Argelia Oran 343.83
2.2.7.4. PMB mixing process. There are different polymers used as ad­ United Kingdom United Kingdom Greenock 2967.51
ditives to bitumen depending on the technical requirements of each Nigeria Nigeria Douala 6882.43
pavement and its application. They can vary between 2 and 5% of the
mass content and the most used in Europe is the SBS (styrene-butadiene- 3. Results
styrene) in granular form. In this study, data from (Eurobitume, 2012)
were also considered, taking a 3.5% addition of SBS. The inventory Once all the data for the inventories of the different processes were
values are detailed in Table 14. compiled, the EF of the rehabilitation process was evaluated. This is the
third formal stage of the LCA and EF methodology, where the potential
environmental impact results of all the processes and stages are obtained
according to the previously selected impact categories from

Table 8
Data inventory of HMA manufacturing processes (García-Anguera, 2015).
Item Unit AC22 bin S AC22 base S R25 AC16 surf S (road services) AC16 surf S (bridge decks) BBTM 11B

Diesel consumption of extender machine MJ 153,870 10,116 95,997 1158 192,980

Diesel consumption of storage silo MJ 404,921 26,622 252,623 3048 507,843
Diesel consumption of pneumatic roller MJ 110,138 7241 68,713 836 137,887
Diesel consumption of vibratory roller MJ 344,183 22,629 214,730 2613 430,897
HMA truck transportation tkm 105,451 55,464 65,789 1134 132,254
RAP truck transportation tkm – 12,424 –
Gravel truck transportation tkm – – – 34,020 3,967,627
Asphalt plant processinga t 21,090 1386.6 13,158.8 226.8 26,450.8
Gravel t 11,684 936.0 11,658.8 201.4 23,445.8
RAP t – 310.5 – – –
Cement t 803 73.5 802.6 13.4 1603.1
Bitumen 50/70b t 1055 66.6 697.4 – –
Bitumen PMBb t – – – 12.0 1401.9
a
See Table 9.
b
See section 2.2.7.

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Table 12
LCI of bitumen 50/70 from crude refining, by tonne (García-Anguera, 2015).

2.00Eþ02

2.05Eþ01

2.15Eþ01

1.02Eþ01

2.42Eþ00

2.55Eþ02
LU (kg C
Item Unit Total

def)
Electricity consumption MJ 15
Fuel-oil consumption MJ 166
Carbon dioxide emissions kg 14.62

6.83Eþ00

8.37Eþ00
4.00E-01

8.39E-01

2.87E-01

1.30E-02
Inert waste kg 0.06

U235 eq)
IRhh (kg
Table 13

NMVOC eq)
LCI of bitumen storage, by tonne (Eurobitume, 2012).

7.20E-02

2.04E-02

4.82E-02

5.60E-02

8.16E-04

1.97E-01
POF (kg
Item Unit Total

Natural gas consumption kg 0.19

Crude consumption kg 2.20

2.02E-01

5.93E-02

1.54E-01

2.04E-01

2.62E-03

6.22E-01
Coal consumption kg 0.30

EUt (mol
Uranium consumption kg 0.00002

N eq)
Water consumption kg 24
CO2 (emissions to air) g 7831
SO2 (emissions to air) g 27

1.80E-02

5.35E-03

1.44E-02

1.86E-02

2.40E-04

5.65E-02
EUm (kg
NOx (emissions to air) g 11

N eq)
CO (emissions to air) g 3
CH4 (emissions to air) g 6
Hydrocarbons (emissions to air) g 38.7
NMVOC (emissions to air) g 3

EUf (kg

4.41E-

6.81E-

4.74E-

2.98E-

1.90E-

1.02E-
P eq)
Particles (emissions to air) g 3.4

04

05

04

05

06

03
COD (emissions to water) g 30
BOD (emissions to water) g 29.8
Suspended solids (emissions to water) g 4.1

PM2.5 eq)

8.96E-03

3.72E-03

9.23E-03

5.34E-03

1.04E-04

2.74E-02
PM (kg
Hydrocarbons (emissions to water) g 9.5
P compounds (emissions to water) g 4.79
N compounds (emissions to water) g 1.51
S compounds (emissions to water) g 119

9.79E-07

6.30E-07

7.57E-07

1.02E-07

1.31E-08

2.48E-06
Hydrocarbons, oils (emissions to soil) g 10.0

(CTUh)
HTPnc

Table 14

7.38E-07

1.34E-07

3.72E-07

1.10E-07

4.00E-09

1.36E-06
(CTUh)

LCI of PMB mixing, by tonne (Eurobitume, 2012).

SWU: Surface Water Units; CTUh: Cancer Toxicity Units (human); CTUe: Cancer Toxicity Units (ecosystem).
EF results by unit of analysis (rehabilitated m2) by life-cycle stage of the traditional rehabilitation process.

HTPc

Item Unit Total

Bitumen 50/70 T 0.965

4.54Eþ03

4.50Eþ02

6.69Eþ02

3.76Eþ02

1.65Eþ01

6.05Eþ03
SBS T 0.035
(CTUe)

Average distance from SBS producer to refinery (transport by truck) Km 500

FEC

Electricity consumption MJ 72
CC (kg CO2

1.07Eþ01

4.78Eþ00

2.29Eþ01

4.13Eþ00

4.27Eþ01
International Life-Cycle Data-system (ILCD) 2011 midpoint method 1.21E-01

(Benini et al., 2014; EC, 2013).

eq)

In this section, results are presented according to the life cycle stages
considered earlier: raw materials extraction, their transport and distri­
bution, manufacturing processes, asphalt pavement and waste man­
1.80E-05

8.86E-07

2.32E-06

7.45E-07

3.25E-08

2.20E-05
CFC-11
OD (kg

agement. Table 15 shows the results by unit of analysis (square meter) of

eq)

the rehabilitation process, by stage and impact category. Subsequently,

Fig. 3 shows the percentage contribution of each stage, by impact
1.28E-03

1.77E-04

1.49E-03

3.01E-05

4.09E-06

2.98E-03

category. In order to analyse each stage in detail, Figs. 4–7 show the
MFR (kg
Sb eq)

percentage contribution of different elements in the main stages (except

end of life).
Extraction of raw materials and manufacturing processes are
WRD (litres

responsible for a large share of total impacts. Extraction of raw materials

5.26Eþ00

8.82Eþ00

1.21Eþ02

6.79Eþ00

1.42Eþ02
Impact category (unit)

2.80E-02

is especially significant for the categories of ozone depletion, freshwater

SWU)

ecotoxicity, ionizing radiation and land use. Manufacturing processes

are responsible for most of the impacts caused in water resource
depletion, mineral fossil and renewable resource depletion and climate
AC (mol

8.91E-

4.31E-

7.95E-

4.34E-

8.10E-

2.56E-

change, while paving activities are important in marine and terrestrial

Hþ)

02

02

02

02

04

01

eutrophication and ozone formation impacts. End-of-life impacts have

minor importance.
Placing of courses

After a more detailed analysis by stage, the following conclusions can

Extraction of raw

Manufacturing

be drawn:
processes
Subsystems

materials

End of life
Transport
Table 15

TOTAL

� Raw materials extraction: Crude oils extraction for bitumen

manufacturing is the most important process in terms of polluting

7
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

Fig. 3. Environmental Footprint contribution of each stage.

Fig. 4. Environmental Footprint contribution of each element in raw materials extraction processes.

emissions. It is important to consider the value of gravel extraction
for HMA AC22 and BBTM due to their high amount.
� Materials manufacturing: The manufacture of bitumen, concrete and
especially asphalt mixtures are the most important contributors to
climate change impacts, mainly due to their high energy
consumption.
� Transportation: The transport of gravel for HMA BBTM asphalt plant
is particularly important due to the high distance from the
manufacturing plant (150 km), if compared to the rest of the plants.
� Paving works: Milling process is the most important due to the high
amount of fuel consumption compared to other processes.
4. Discussion
Results obtained are in the same range as those obtained in earlier
studies. Regarding the climate change impact category, this study pre­
sents a value of 42.7 kg CO2 eq/m2 (Moral, 2016). shows a range of
35–70 kg CO2 eq/m2 in a thesis where different kinds of pavement ap­
plications where studied by means of an LCA (Turk et al., 2016).

8
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

Fig. 5. Environmental Footprint contribution of each element in manufacturing processes.

Fig. 6. Environmental Footprint contribution of each element in transportation processes.

presents values from 31 to 44 kg CO2 eq/m2 in a same rehabilitation
technique but carried out in Slovenia.
This is not a direct comparison to other LCAs because of they perform
other system boundaries, assumptions, and characterization factors
indeed. The reason for showing those literature results is only for testing
that the same range is reached.
Raw materials mining and manufacturing of materials are the stages
with the greatest environmental impacts. The same findings were made
in the aforementioned studies. Therefore, the consideration of using RAP
in an adequate percentage (Zaumanis et al., 2016), avoiding the
extraction and manufacturing of part of the materials, or using other
rehabilitation techniques are advisable in order to decrease the total
environmental impact or EF (Dinis-Almeida et al., 2016).
Table 16 shows the top fifteen most contributing elements in terms of
climate change impacts. The manufacture of bitumen (including the
extraction of crude) and concrete (including the extraction of raw ma­
terials), and the asphalt plant processes are the most important.
In order to benchmark the results with the published literature, other
references and bibliography were consulted for the two most impacting
processes:

9
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on Journal of Environmental Management 252 (2019) 109646

Fig. 7. Environmental Footprint contribution of each element in work on-site processes.

of 17 g CO2 eq/kg of mixture for asphalt mixture processing in

Table 16
Colombia.
Global results of the most contributing elements in climate change impact
category.
5. Conclusions
Elements Value (kg CO2 eq) Percentage
(%)
A comprehensive and to our knowledge first EF has been conducted
Bitumen PMB manufacturing 6.06Eþ05 11.30 for a conventional Spanish road rehabilitation. One of the main appli­
Asphalt plant mixture BBTM 5.50Eþ05 10.25
cations of the study is the possibility to be used as a basis for comparison
Asphalt plant mixture AC22 bin S 4.38Eþ05 8.17
Concrete manufacturing for road services 4.02Eþ05 7.50 with both newer restoration techniques in the country, such as cold-in-
Concrete manufacturing for BBTM 4.01Eþ05 7.48 place, and the use of advanced materials for improving technical prop­
Transport of BBTM to work site 3.50Eþ05 6.53 erties of roads, like the increase of durability of roads or the decrease of
Bitumen 50/70 manufacturing for AC22 bin 3.10Eþ05 5.78
road traffic noise. These results could be also compared to EFs of new
S
Cement manufacturing for AC22 bin S 2.80Eþ05 5.22
road constructions if the same system boundaries, units of analysis,
Asphalt plant mixture A16 surf S 2.73Eþ05 5.09 stages and materials are considered. Both in road construction and
Gravel extraction for BBTM 2.49Eþ05 4.64 rehabilitation projects, the processes and figures for the different impact
Bitumen 50/70 manufacturing for AC16 surf 2.05Eþ05 3.82 categories may considerably vary.
S
It is important to remark that inventory data came from real data of a
Gravel extraction for AC22 bin S 2.03Eþ05 3.78
Cement manufacturing for AC16 surf S 2.01Eþ05 3.75 rehabilitation project, which provides the quantities of materials and the
Milling process 1.77Eþ05 3.31 type of machinery used. This gives a higher degree of quality in the
Gravel extraction for AC16 surf S 1.25Eþ05 2.33 environmental evaluation of this rehabilitation process. However, up­
stream processes such as the extraction of raw materials and other
manufacturing processes were obtained from specific bibliography or
� In the case of the manufacture of bitumen, regarding the climate
databases, but not less accurately.
change impact category, direct results from ecoinvent v3.3 database
Results presented are only for the environmental impacts of the road
are 244 g CO2 eq/kg of bitumen in extraction of oil crude and
rehabilitation process, considering the life cycle of the materials used
transportation to the plant, and (Eurobitume, 2012) value is 200 g
until the paving practice. The whole road life-cycle has not been
CO2 eq/kg of bitumen. The calculated value for this study is 254 g
considered, therefore, the processes of construction, conservation and
CO2 eq/kg of bitumen for these stages. Moreover, the calculated
end-of-life of the materials used have not been taken into account.
emissions for the crude oil refining process are 31 g CO2 eq/kg
Global results allowed the identification of ‘hotspots’ or critical
bitumen while (Eurobitume, 2012) has a value of 38 g CO2 eq/kg of
points in order to consider future actions for reducing the environmental
bitumen. Thus, the values of bitumen manufacturing are in the range
impact, such as:
of published results.
� In the asphalt mixture manufacturing process, the results were
� The processes of raw materials mining. The use of RAP or other
directly adopted from (Moral, 2016). They are considered adequate
rehabilitation techniques seem to be advisable in order to reduce the
for this study because they were obtained from manufacturing plants
total environmental impact of road rehabilitation processes, espe­
in Spain. Climate change impact results vary between 19 and 20 g
cially in climate change impact category and those related to natural
CO2 eq/kg mixture (Ruiz et al., 2015, 2014). obtained a similar value
resources depletion or land use categories.

10
D. Garraín and Y. Lech�
on
� Certain processes of manufacturing materials. The manufacture of
bitumen with lower temperature techniques (warm-mix asphalt or
cold-in-place) may improve the environmental impact results but the
same quality of roads, in terms of physical properties or life cycle
span, has to be assured.
As final remark, this study has contributed to the document related to
the Sub-Product Category Rules for Rehabilitation Services of highways,
streets and roads.2
Acknowledgements
This study was supported by REPARA2.03 ‘Advanced and sustainable
developments for efficient road asphalt pavement rehabilitation techniques’,
an industrial research and experimental development project, carried
out in Spain, with the financial support of the CDTI (Centre for Tech­
nological and Industrial Development), a Public Business Entity,
answering to the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and
Competitiveness.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2019.109646.
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