Life Cycle Inventory: bitumen

Author(s): F. Bernard, T. Blomberg, M. Southern
Paper category: symposium
Book title: International Symposium on Life Cycle Assessment and Construction – Civil engineering and buildings
Editor(s): A. Ventura and C. de la Roche
Print ISBN: 978-2-35158-127-8
e-ISBN: 978-2-35158-128-5
Publisher: RILEM Publications SARL
Pages: 283 – 290
Total Pages: 8
Language: English

Abstract: In March 2011, Eurobitume published a new version of the life cycle inventory (LCI) [1] of bitumen first published in 1999 [2]. The intended use is to feed LCI studies where paving grade bitumens are used. Consequently, the environmental impacts resulting from such emissions have not been assessed. Following the product standard EN 12591 [3], the LCI of paving bitumen with penetration grade from 20 to 220 1/10 mm is carried out. Then, LCIs for polymer modified bitumen with 3.5% polymer and bitumen emulsion with 65% bitumen are assessed.
The bitumen LCI is a cradle to gate study. It covers crude oil extraction, shipping, refining and storage steps. Regarding refining step, the study focus on straight-run distillation route but three other refining routes are assessed: semi-blowing, de-asphalting and vis-breaking.
The LCI has been updated using the most recent and most representative data collected by industry and coming from the Ecoinvent database [11].
The methodology has been reviewed to be consistent with ISO 14040 and 14044 [4] life cycle assessment standards published in 2006. In addition, the LCI follows the 2000 ISO Technical Report 14049 [4] recommendations regarding allocation at refining level which is based on relative value. In addition, a sensibility analysis is carried out regarding allocation procedure and LCIs including infrastructure impact are provided.
As part of these standards, the report has been peer reviewed by an independent LCI expert. A complete Ecoinvent-enable inventory is available as an electronic excel file online.

Keywords: Life Cycle Inventory (LCI), Responsible sourcing, Environment, Carbon

Online publication: 2012
Publication Type: full_text
Public price (Euros): 0.00