0000000000008751
AUTHOR
Teresa Maria Gulotta
Energy and Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of asphalt pavements: A Scenario Analysis for Urban Roads
This paper aims at calculating the life-cycle energy and the environmental impacts pertaining to roads management, including materials production, transportation, construction, maintenance, and rehabilitation. A life-cycle approach is applied to assess energy and environmental impacts of a typical Italian urban road, according to the ISO 14040 series. In more detail, the Authors assess the energy and environmental profile of different optimized scenarios of bituminous mixtures. The aim of scenario analysis is to identify the less impacting scenario from an energy and environmental point of view. For each analysed scenario, the contribution of each life-cycle step to the total impacts and th…
Constructal law optimization of a boiler
The paper aims at the optimization of the design of a biomass boiler under the inspiration of the Constructal Law by Bejan. The boiler is of the smoke tubes typology, fuel being biomass pellets. The smoke tubes are 16 and are placed in a staggered configuration. A model is built in MATLAB environment, based on empirical correlations and the mean log temperature methodology. The analysis is based on the development of a wide parametric analysis that involves variations of diameters, numbers and positioning of the tubes. Results are based on the concept of the overall performance coefficient methodology and investigate both the pressure drops variation and the thermal power generated in the d…
Measuring the Sustainability of Transportation Infrastructures Through Comparative Life Cycle and Energy Assessment
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development was adopted at the United Nations Sustainable Development Summit on 25 September 2015. It addresses people, planet and prosperity needs and particularly focuses on transport systems that must be 1) Sustainable. 2) Quality and resilient. 3) Safe. 4) Affordable and accessible. The Research Project PRIN USR342 focuses on similar concepts and the expected outputs are 3 paving solutions (made with recycled materials and sustainable technologies), 4 sets of modules (software), and 2 platforms. In this view, the objective of this study is the identification of the best pavement technology in terms of energy and environmental performance. To this aim a LC…
A bottom-up harmonized energy-environmental models for europe (BOHEEME): A case study on the thermal insulation of the EU-28 building stock
Abstract The paper presents a methodological approach, called “BOttom-up Harmonized Energy-Environmental Models for Europe” (BOHEEME), that combines bottom-up modeling, energy dynamic simulation, and life cycle assessment for evaluating and comparing the energy and environmental effects of different renovation strategies of the residential EU building stocks, from micro to the macro level. The study defines 672 building models representative of the residential EU-28 building stocks built before 2010, called archetypes, and the improvement of their envelope, applying different insulation materials from a traditional one to bio-based materials and studying their environmental effects via LCA.…
Integration of Building Simulation and Life Cycle Assessment: A TRNSYS Application
Abstract The study proposes a tool developed within the TRNSYS environment aimed at integrating its building simulation features during the use phase with a Life Cycle Assessment approach. The tool can be used to investigate the relevance of each life-cycle step of the building on the primary energy consumption and global warming potential. The Life Cycle stages can be modelled with different approaches: direct input of the embodied energy and global warming potential values for each life cycle step as defined in the EN 15978, use of an internal database of embodied energy and global warming potential of construction materials and energy systems, direct connections of building simulation ou…
ELISA: A simplified tool for evaluating the Environmental Life-cycle Impacts of Solar Air-conditioning systems
The paper presents ELISA, a simplified tool for estimating the Environmental Life-cycle Impacts of Solar Air-conditioning systems. The tool is designed to support researchers, designers and decision makers in a simplified evaluation of the life cycle energy and environmental potential benefits related to the installation of solar heating and cooling systems in substitution of conventional ones. The tool was developed within the research activities of Task 53 “New Generation Solar Cooling & Heating Systems (PV or solar thermally driven systems)” of the International Energy Agency.
A Constructal Law optimization of a boiler inspired by Life Cycle thinking
Abstract The aim of the paper is to explore how design optimization contributes to a technology's ecological evolution. The article develops this concept through an application of Constructal Law, used to account for the “evolution” of technologies design (configuration, shape, structure, pattern, rhythm), and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), used for quantifying the environmental impacts of the design choices. The combination of both methods assesses how technology evolution affects the environment during its life, extending the concept of evolution of design. The study is applied to a case study of a real biomass boiler. The study analyses basic case and a series of alternative scenarios opti…
A life cycle scenario analysis of different pavement technologies for urban roads.
In the past, lowest price was the award criterion, given that structural capacity and safety were assured. In the last years, environmental, energy, and long-term impacts have been introduced (climate change, resource depletion, energy consumption, generated solid waste, discharged water, and emissions). Unfortunately, the introduction of new pavement technologies and materials (i.e., waste plastics) affects maintenance and rehabilitation processes and call for accurate and timeliness studies and criteria. Consequently, this paper presents an energy and environmental assessment of an Italian urban road and considers different material-related scenarios that fully comply with emerging techno…
TOWARDS THE DECARBONIZATION OF THE EU BUILDING STOCK: AN INTEGRATED BUILDING STOCK RENOVATION MODELING APPROACH
In Europe, the residential building stock is responsible for about 40% of the energy demand and about 36% of the CO2 emission at global level. Considering that almost 70% of the existing building stock will still be used in 2050, a long-term vision is needed to align with future challenges to avoid having significant increases in carbon emissions. The European policymakers have a long-recognized potential energy saving associated with the renovation of the existing building stocks, as demonstrated by the directives on the Energy performance of buildings (EPBD), introducing also the need to developed an integrated buildings design approach with environmental analysis. The purpose of this the…
Life Cycle Energy and Environmental Assessment of the Thermal Insulation Improvement in Residential Buildings
The refurbishment of the building stock is a key strategy towards the achievement of the climate and energy goals of the European Union. This study aims at evaluating the energy and environmental impacts associated with retrofitting a residential apartment to improve its vertical envelope thermal insulation. Two insulation materials, stone wool and cellulose fibers, are compared. The life cycle assessment methodology is applied assuming 1 m2 of retrofitted vertical envelope as functional unit. Moreover, to estimate the net energy and environmental benefits achievable in the retrofitted scenario compared with the non-retrofitted one, a second analysis is performed in which the system boundar…
Introducing exergy analysis in life cycle assessment: A case study
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a methodology for assessing the potential environmental aspects associated with a product or service along its life cycle. However, in the case of energy technologies, it is suggested that the LCA of a product encompasses also further aspects other than environmental aspects and primary energy calculations. In particular, to optimize the reduction of raw materials during the whole life cycle, it is important to introduce the assessment of the irreversibility, applying the exergy analysis. In this paper, an integrated approach of exergy analysis and LCA is proposed, developing the Life-cycle quality index able to suggest potential exergy inefficiencies and the …