Pavement Life Cycle Assessment Workshop, May 5–7, 2010 in Davis, California, USA

Abstract

Purpose

A workshop was convened on life cycle assessment (LCA) applied to pavement. The workshop’s primary goals were to establish common practices for conducting LCAs for pavements. In general, pavement LCA has been implemented without clear guidelines for modeling assumptions and reporting. This shortcoming has led to challenges in interpreting and comparing pavement LCA outcomes.

Methods

A 2-day workshop was convened with 45 participants from academia, US and foreign transportation agencies, and industry. The workshop yielded some agreement and dissent on proposed guidelines for implementing and reporting of pavement LCA. Discourse on particular topics was facilitated through break-out sessions tailored to the workshop attendees and their respective areas of expertise.

Results and conclusions

Consensus was not reached for all issues discussed at the workshop. Where consensus did not emerge, dissenting views were recorded and included in workshop reporting. However, the majority of topics did resolve with consensus and informed the development and revision of a publicly available framework and guideline for pavement LCA. This framework and guideline was available at the conference website (http://www.ucprc.ucdavis.edu/P-LCA/index.html) and remains available for continued comment.