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Mueller, Karl G. "Life cycle assessment in engineering design." Thesis, Imperial College London, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/8049.
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Making correct design decisions during the early stages of the engineering design process is increasingly seen to be important, as changes during the later stage can be costly. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is used as a method to evaluate the design from 'cradle to grave'. In concept design, decisions are made that have a most significant influence on the life cycle, but at this stage the lack of detail makes LCA very difficult if not impossible. This thesis introduces a method that enables an 'order-of-magnitude' life cycle assessment during the concept stage of the design process. This is achieved by modelling the life cycle inventory as a function of design parameters for complete product families used in engineering design. The hypothesis is that relatively few so-called life cycle parameters determine the largest part of the life cycle inventory. Furthermore, design parameters are related to life cycle parameters, which are mathematically modelled. Design parameters are chosen so that they can be estimated early during the design process. The models of the life cycle parameters are expressed in terms of upper and lower limits, summarising data from many product families. More detailed models describe the relationships of single product families. The method is suitable for software implementation, which will especially aid the handling of sensitivity analysis. Two case studies (sealed lead acid batteries, three-phase asynchronous motors) are used to illustrate how the life cycle parameters are related to the design parameters. An overall outline of how the method is implemented into the overall design process completes the thesis (evaluation of parallel and series configuration hybrid electric vehicle).
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Cohn, Russell S. (Russell Sanford). "Electric vehicle life cycle analysis." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1994. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/36472.
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Jiménez-González, Concepción. "Life Cycle Assessment in Pharmaceutical Applications." NCSU, 2002. http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/theses/available/etd-20020207-155355.
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In the present work, life cycle information is developed to provide environmental input into process development and chemical selection within the pharmaceutical industry. The evaluation at various stages of the development process for Sertraline Hydrochloride, an effective chiral antidepressant, was conducted. This evaluation included the Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) and further Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) to compare several synthetic routes and production processes of this pharmaceutical product. To complete the Sertraline analysis, a methodology to generate gate-to-gate life cycle information of chemical substances was developed based on a transparent methodology of chemical engineering process design (an ab initio approach). In the broader concept of an LCI, the information of each gate-to-gate module can be linked accordingly in a production chain, including the extraction of raw materials, transportation, disposal, reuse, etc. to provide a full cradle-to-gate evaluation. Furthermore, the refinery, energy and treatment sub-modules were developed to assess the environmental burdens related to energy requirements and waste treatment. Finally, the concept of a Á¤lean/Green Technology GuideÃ?was also proposed as an expert system that would provide the scientists with comparative environmental and safety performance information on available technologies for commonly performed unit operations in the pharmaceutical industry. With the expected future application of computer-aid techniques for combinatorial synthesis, an increase of the number of parallel routes to be evaluated in the laboratory scale might be predicted. Life cycle information might also be added to this combinatorial synthesis approach for R&D. This input could be introduced in the earlier stages of process design in order to select cleaner materials or processes using a holistic perspective. This life cycle approach in pharmaceutical synthesis is intended to facilitate the evaluation, comparison, and selection of alternative synthesis routes, by incorporating the overall environmental impact of routes.
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Rodseth, Clare Josephine. "End-of-life in South African product life cycle assessment." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/29363.
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Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a tool specifically developed for quantifying and assessing the environmental burden of a product across its entire life cycle, thus providing powerful support for sustainable product design. There exists a geographical imbalance in the adoption and distribution of LCA studies, with a notably poor penetration into developing countries, resulting from a lack of technical expertise, reliable data, and an inability to engage with the key issues of developing countries. These challenges are particularly prevalent in waste management. The limitations in current LCA capacity for representing product end-of-life, coupled to the disparity in waste management practices between developed and developing countries means that LCA is currently unable to accurately model product end-of-life in South Africa. This means that, for imported products designed on the basis of LCA, the upstream impacts may be accurate, while the end-of-life is not. Therefore, to improve the use of LCA as a tool to support sustainable product design, there is a need to develop life cycle datasets and methods that accurately reflect the realities of waste management in developing countries. The objectives of this dissertation are to (i) identify the current shortcomings of existing LCA datasets in representing the end-of-life stage of general waste in a South African context, and (ii) propose modifications to existing datasets to better reflect the realities of waste management in a South African context and extract lessons from this for use elsewhere. To meet these objectives, research was undertaken in three main stages, with the outcome of each stage used to inform the development of each subsequent stage. The first stage aimed to establish the status quo with regards to general waste management in South Africa. This investigation was informed through a desktop review of government and other publicly available reports, supplemented by field work and stakeholder engagements. These results formed the basis for the second stage: a review of LCA capacity for representing product end-of-life in the South African context. The review of datasets was limited to those contained within SimaPro v8.3 and was undertaken with the aim of understanding the extent to which current datasets are capable of representing South African waste management practices. Finally, three cases of existing LCA datasets were explored. This included testing modifications that could be made in an attempt to improve their applicability to the South African reality. In South Africa, a major limitation in developing a quantified mapping of waste flows lies in the paucity of reliable waste data and the exclusion of the contribution of the informal sector in existing waste data repositories. It was estimated that South Africa generates approximately 12.7 million tonnes of domestic waste per annum, of which an estimated 29% is not collected or treated via formal management options. For both formal and informal general waste, disposal to land (landfill and dumping) represents the most utilised waste management option. Landfill conditions in South Africa range from well-managed sanitary landfills to open dumps. Considering only licensed landfill facilities, it is estimated that large and medium landfill sites accept the majority of South Africa’s general waste (54% and 31% respectively), while the balance is managed in small (12%) and communal (3%) sites. Considering the quantity of informal domestic waste enables a crude estimation of household waste distribution between different landfill classes. In this instance, while the majority of waste (40%) is still managed in large formal landfill sites, an appreciable quantity (26%) is managed in private dumps. Within SimaPro v8.3 landfill disposal is best represented by the sanitary landfill datasets contained within the ecoinvent v3.3 database. SimaPro preserves the modular construction of the ecoinvent dataset, meaning that various generic modifications to these datasets can be made, such as the elimination or addition of burdens, redefinition of the value of a burden, or substitution of a linked dataset. Practically, such modifications are limited to process-specific burdens. However, wastespecific burdens are of greater significance in the life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) result of a landfill process. Waste-specific emissions are generated using the underlying ecoinvent landfill emission model. The current model structure allows for the parametrisation of waste composition in addition to landfill gas (LFG) capture and utilisation efficiencies. However, besides the incorporation of a methane correction factor to account for the effect that various site conditions have on the waste degradation environment, the extent to which the existing model can be adapted to represent alternative landfill conditions is limited. This is particularly true in the case of leachate generation and release. Although adaptation that incorporates the effect of climatic conditions on waste degradability and emission release is possible, this requires a high level of country-specific data and modelling expertise. Thus, the practicality of such a modification within the skills set of most LCA practitioners is questionable. Further limitations in the existing modelling framework include its inability to quantify the potential impacts of practices characteristic of unmanaged sites such as open-burning, waste scavenging, and the presence of vermin and other animal vectors for disease. Analysis of the LCIA results for different landfill scenarios showed that regardless of either the deposited material or the specific landfill conditions modelled, the time frame considered had the most pronounced effect on the normalised potential impacts. Regardless of landfill conditions, when long-term leachate emissions are considered, freshwater and marine ecotoxicity impacts dominate the overall potential impacts of the site. This result implies that if landfill disposal is modelled over the long-term, the potential impacts of the process has less to do with site-specific conditions than it does to do with the intrinsic properties of the material itself. Given the ensuing extent of degradation that occurs over the time frame considered, the practise of very long-term modelling can equalise landfills that differ strongly in the short-term. In terms of product design on the basis of LCA, the choice of material can be more strongly influenced by the time frame considered than the specific landfill scenario. From a short-term perspective, for fast degrading materials the impacts incurred from leachate emissions and their subsequent treatment are of lesser importance than those arising from LFG. From a long-term perspective by contrast, leachate emissions have a significant effect on the LCIA result. Investigation into the effect of reduced precipitation on the LCIA result showed that the exclusion of leachate emissions lowers the potential impacts of a number of impact categories, with the most substantial quantified reduction observed in the freshwater and marine ecotoxicity impact categories. This result implies that for dry climates, the long-term impacts of landfilling could be significantly lower than when compared to landfill under temperate conditions, with the potential impacts of the waste remaining locked-up in the landfill. Given quantified findings on South Africa’s dependence on both formal and informal disposal, and the variation in landfill conditions across the country, it can be concluded that LCA results for the impacts of products originating from global supply chains, but consumed and disposed of in South Africa, will be inaccurate for the end-of-life stage if modifications to end-of-life modelling are not made. The findings from this dissertation provide the basis for i) a crude estimate of ‘market shares’ of different disposal practises and ii) guidelines for parameterisation of material specific emission factors, in particular for shorter term emissions, focused on LFG and leachate emissions.
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Usanmaz, Gokhan. "End-of-life cycle product management." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/8736.
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Thesis (M.Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, 2000.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 75-77).
Market leadership requires effective management of product life cycle, starting from the launch of a new product until its retirement. In this particular project, an exploratory study of business practices in the management of products in the decline phase and the eventual decision of product abandonment is conducted through surveys and interviews of senior executives from Fortune 500 companies, focusing mainly on food, networking equipment, medical devices, consumer electronics and retail industries. Actual names of the companies are not revealed for confidentiality reasons. Also, the implementations, assumptions and level of acceptance of decision support system (DSS) modules on product lifecycle management are analyzed. Finally, companies' business processes are compared and enhancements to current DSS systems are proposed.
by Gokhan Usanmaz.
M.Eng.
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Evdokimova, Tatiana. "Life cycle assessment in construction field: A life cycle cost analysis of reinforcement concrete bridge." Master's thesis, Alma Mater Studiorum - Università di Bologna, 2014. http://amslaurea.unibo.it/7371/.
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The present work is included in the context of the assessment of sustainability in the construction field and is aimed at estimating and analyzing life cycle cost of the existing reinforced concrete bridge “Viadotto delle Capre” during its entire life. This was accomplished by a comprehensive data collection and results evaluation. In detail, the economic analysis of the project is performed.
The work has investigated possible design alternatives for maintenance/rehabilitation and end-of-life operations, when structural, functional, economic and also environmental requirements have to be fulfilled. In detail, the economic impact of different design options for the given reinforced concrete bridge have been assessed, whereupon the most economically, structurally and environmentally efficient scenario was chosen. The Integrated Life-Cycle Analysis procedure and Environmental Impact Assessment were also discussed in this work.
The scope of this thesis is to illustrate that Life Cycle Cost analysis as part of Life Cycle Assessment approach could be effectively used to drive the design and management strategy of new and existing structures. The final objective of this contribution is to show how an economic analysis can influence decision-making in the definition of the most sustainable design alternatives. The designers can monitor the economic impact of different design strategies in order to identify the most appropriate option.
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Töyrä, Mendez Ewa, Malin Fröberg, and Larsson Johanna Holmqvist. "Life Cycle Analysis : a study of the climate impact of a single-family building from a life cycle perspective." Thesis, Uppsala universitet, Institutionen för teknikvetenskaper, 2018. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-355294.
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Historically, most of the climate impact of a building has derived from the buildings operational phase. However, recent studies show that the climate impact of the construction phase of a building is of the same dimension as the operational phase. Current building regulations regard the energy performance of buildings, excluding any obligations of reporting the environmental impact of the building during its life cycle. In 2017, Boverket was commissioned by the Swedish government to develop a proposal for a new climate declaration of buildings based on a life cycle perspective. The application of life cycle analysis in the Swedish building and construction sector is limited, and in particular when considering single-family buildings. Thus, the aim of the thesis is to investigate the applicability of the life cycle analysis methodology to single-family buildings and compare with former studies on multi-family buildings. This is done by studying the climate impact of a single-family building through a life cycle perspective. Simulations are done in the simulation tools VIP Energy and Byggsektorns miljöberäkningsverktyg BM. The result of the study show that the climate impact of the building is equally distributed during the building’s constructional and operational phase, accounting for 50.1 % and 49.9 % relatively. The total climate impact through the life cycle of the building is 541 kg CO2-eq/m2 Atemp, which is somewhat consistent with results of previous studies on multi-family buildings. The result also shows that the material production and the energy use are the processes that contributes the most to the climate impact during the life cycle of the building. Furthermore, the result indicates that there are no significant differences in the methodology of life cycle analysis between single-family and multi-family buildings.
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Dong, Bo M. Eng Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Life-cycle assessment of wastewater treatment plants." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/73783.
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Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2012.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 57-58).
This thesis presents a general model for the carbon footprints analysis of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), using a life cycle assessment (LCA) approach. In previous research, the issue of global warming is often related to traditional industries with high carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, such as power plants and transportation. However, the analyses of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) have drawn increasing attention, due to the intensive greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) from WWTPs. WWTPs have been listed in the 7 th place for both methane (CH 4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) total emissions. In addition, WWTPs indirectly contribute to a huge amount of CO2 emissions. The final results have shown that more than half of the carbon footprints from the La Gavia WWTP are from the indirect emissions of CO2, which is caused by the intensive energy consumption. The direct emissions of CH4 and N2O combined contribute more than 30 percent of GHG emission. The finally section of the thesis compares the environmental impacts of the La Gavia WWTP with case of no WWTP at all. It has been concluded that although the La Gavia WWTP increased the total carbon footprints, it has much better control of eutrophication potential (EP).
by Bo Dong.
M.Eng.
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Sousa, Inês (Maria Inês Silva Sousa) 1972. "Integrated product design and life-cycle assessment." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1998. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/46141.
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Benkherouf, M. (Moaadh). "Life cycle assessment of arsenic removal methods." Master's thesis, University of Oulu, 2018. http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-201812043210.
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The presence of arsenic in drinking water has been a major concern for years, due to its concentration being above the maximum allowable limit of 10 μg/l. Ingestion of arsenic-contaminated water causes different types of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, skin lesion and more. Many techniques have been developed and used to reduce arsenic levels to the maximum allowable limit. The conventional methods to do so are adsorption, membrane filtration, coagulation-flocculation, oxidation, and ion exchange. The most common adsorption material is activated carbon produced from hard coal, but there is a shift towards using agro-waste materials in order to produce a more environmentally-friendly adsorbent with high rejection levels. Such materials include cocoa pod husk, ice cream beans, and red mombin seeds, where cocoa pod husk AC was able to remove 80% of arsenate, and red mombin seeds AC removed arsenate almost completely. Nanofiltration membranes were reportedly effective for arsenic removal, reaching a removal percentage of 90%. In this work, a life cycle assessment analysis using SimaPro was conducted for arsenic removal using red mombin seeds activated carbon and spiral wound nanofiltration membranes, as they are able to reach high removal efficiencies. The methods were then compared based on their impacts on the different environmental and damage categories to determine which is the better option. The results showed that nanofiltration had the lowest environmental impacts over the different impact categories by a huge differenceJuomaveden sisältämä arseeni on ollut merkittävä ongelma jo pitkään, sillä arseenipitoisuus ylittää usein sille asetun raja-arvon 10 μg/l. Arseenipitoisen juomaveden käyttö aiheuttaa muun muassa syöpä- ja verenkiertoelimistön sairauksia sekä iho-ongelmia. Juomaveden arseenipitoisuuden vähentämiseksi on kehitetty useita menetelmiä, joista tavallisimpia ovat adsorptio, kalvoerotus, koagulaatio ja flokkaus, hapetus ja ioninvaihto. Yleisin adsorptiomateriaali on aktiivihiili, joka on valmistettu kivihiilestä, mutta nykyisin maatalousjätteestä valmistetut adsorbentit ovat kiinnostuksen kohteena, sillä ne ovat ympäristöystävällisempiä ja niiden avulla voidaan saavuttaa korkea haitta-aineiden poistoprosentti. Tällaisia materiaaleja ovat muun muassa kaakaopavun kuoret ja punamombinin siemenet. Tutkimuksissa on saavutettu kaakaopavun kuorista valmistetun adsorbentin avulla 80 %:n poistuma arseenille ja punamombinin siemenet ovat poistaneet vedestä arseenin lähes kokonaan. Nanosuodatuksessa kalvot ovat tutkimusten mukaan poistaneet arseenista 90 %. Tässä tutkimuksessa suoritettiin SimaPro-ohjelmiston avulla elinkaariarviointi kahdelle vedenkäsittelymenetelmälle: adsorptiolle, jossa käytettiin punamombinin siemenistä valmistettua adsorbenttia, sekä nanosuodatukselle, jossa käytettiin spiraalikalvoja. Menetelmiä verrattiin niiden ympäristövaikutusten perusteella parhaan vaihtoehdon löytämiseksi. Tulosten perusteella nanosuodatuksen ympäristövaikutukset kaikissa vaikutusluokissa olivat merkittävästi alhaisemmat
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Hau, Jorge Luis. "Integrating life cycle assessment, energy and emergy analysis." The Ohio State University, 2002. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1407139681.
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Arena, Noemi. "Life cycle engineering of a system to deliver self-chilled beverages." Thesis, University of Surrey, 2016. http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/812336/.
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The chill-on-demand system is a technology designed to provide cooled products on demand, thereby avoiding any requirement for chilled storage. It uses the cooling effect provided by the endothermic desorption of carbon dioxide previously adsorbed onto a bed of activated carbon contained in an inner component of the self-chilling product. This has the potential to be applied to any type of product that needs to be cold at the point of consumption. The principles of life cycle engineering have been utilized to evaluate the overall environmental performance of one possible application of this technology: a self-chilling beverage can, with a steel outer can to contain the beverage and an inner aluminium can to contain the adsorbent. The primary aim of this research is to devise a way to ensure that the self-chilling can supplies the best cooling performance with minimal global environmental impact. First, the adsorption/desorption process as a means of cooling was investigated, together with its application to the specific case of carbon dioxide adsorbed on a bed of activated carbon obtained from coconut shells. A specific experimental activity was designed and supported by the implementation of a transient heat exchange model. Next, the potential environmental impacts of the product were evaluated by using a Life Cycle Assessment tool. The analysis considered all the life cycle stages of a self-chilling can: from the manufacture of each part of the beverage container, to its utilization and end-of-life management. The results, compared with those of a conventional beverage can, highlight the importance of using activated carbon derived from biomass and locating its production in countries with a low carbon-intensity electricity supply. More substantial environmental and technical improvements would depend on finding adsorbents with much larger capacity, and developing a system with very high rates of recovery and re-use.
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Wan, Qiansu. "Life Cycle Assessment of Paper Based Printed Circuits." Licentiate thesis, KTH, Skolan för informations- och kommunikationsteknik (ICT), 2017. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-219405.
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Printed circuit boards have been massively manufactured and wildly used in all kinds of electronic devices during people’s daily life for more than thirty years since the last century. As a highly integrated device mainly consists of silicon base, an etched copper layer and other soldered components, massive production of printed circuit boards are considered to be environmentally unfriendly due to the wet chemical manufacturing mode and lack of recycling ability. On the other hand, the newly invented ink jet printing technology enables cost-effective manufacturing of flexible, thin and disposable electrical devices, which avoid acid etching process and lead to less toxic emissions into the environment. It is important to consider life cycle analysis for quantitative environmental impact evaluation and comparison of both printed circuit boards and printed electronics to enhance the sustainability of a new technology with product design and development. This thesis first reviews the current approaches to conventional and modern printing methods, as well as the state-of-the-art analysis of sustainability and environmental assessment methodologies. In the second part, a typical ink jet printed electronic device is introduced (an active flexible cable for wearable electrocardiogram monitoring). This active cable is designed for the interconnection between bio electrodes and central medical devices for bio signal transmission. As the active cable consists of five different metal transmission traces which are formed by printing conductive ink onto paper substrates, different shielding methods are investigated to ensure high quality bio signal transmission. Specifically, the results prove that passive shielding methods can significantly decrease the cross talk between different transmission traces, enabling the transmitting of bio signals for wearable ECG monitoring. This research also explores environmental issues related to printed electronics. For the full life cycle of printed electronics, we focused not only on quantitative environmental emissions to air, fresh water, sea and industrial soil, but also on resource consumption and impacts analysis. Finally, comparative environmental performance evaluation of traditional cables and ink jet printed active cables are made to examine the environmental impact and sustainability of both technologies, and the results show the strengths and weaknesses of each technology by analysis and assessment.QC 20171205
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Asif, Muhammad. "Life cycle assessment of aluminium-clad timber windows." Thesis, Edinburgh Napier University, 2002. http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/2505.
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Over the last century a temperature rise of 0.6 C m global climate and the affiliated greenhouse effects have inflicted enormous impacts in the form of natural catastrophes, economical losses, health problems and seasonal disorder. If human activities continue at existing pace, a further temperature rise of 2.5 C is being anticipated over the next hundred years, which may cause unimaginable damage to humanity and ecology of the planet. In such a prevailing global environmental scenario sustainability is the need of hour and should be given the prime importance in execution of activities in all sectors in order to keep future secure for coming generations. Windows are amongst the most sensitive elements in a building envelope, also, due to their multi-disciplinary role, they are important not only for their effects on interior environment but also for the energy performance of the building. Energy contents and environmental impacts of the materials involved, add up on to window significance in the ecology of buildings. Energy efficient windows with least possible environmental burden over their whole life cycle are thus very important in achieving desired levels of sustainability in general, particularly in buildings. The present work addresses the sustainability of double glazed aluminium clad timber windows adopting the life cycle assessment (LCA) approach. LCA of windows helps cutting down the associated ecological burdens at all stages, i.e. extraction/production of materials, operation, maintenance and disposal of windows at the end of their service life. Cost effectiveness and productivity, the important features of sustainability, have been evaluated for aluminium clad timber and timber windows on the basis of life cycle cost assessment (LCCA) approach. Value engineering (VE) of aluminium clad timber windows has also been addressed. Running and/or maintenance costs which largely determine the life cycle costing have been estimated and the most cost effective options are presented. Four different types of windows, made of aluminium, aluminium clad timber, PVC and timber frame, have also been compared with respect to the ecology of frame materials - covering energy contents and environmental loads, maintenance and durability, service life and costing. A survey has been carried out with the help of housing authorities, architects and surveyors within UK, to study the performance of these windows in real life. A series of accelerated tests have been carried out to study the weathering performance of the candidate windows. The results have revealed that aluminium clad timber windows have excellent resistance against weathering conditions and they perform better than aluminium, PVC and timber windows under any conditions. In an ongoing research project at Napier, copper (Cu) coated silicon carbide (SiC) reinforcement particles have been used in aluminium 6061 matrix to enhance the mechanical properties of the Al SiC metal matrix composite (MMC), which is a prospective material to be used in window hardware. Results have indicated that Cu coating does not bring any additional corrosion loads onto the MMC. Recommendations for further work have also been laid out.
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Gastelum, Zepeda Leonardo. "Life Cycle Assessment of a Wave Energy Converter." Thesis, KTH, Industriell ekologi, 2017. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-206486.
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Renewable energies had accomplish to become part of a new era in the energy development area, making people able to stop relying on fossil fuels. Nevertheless the environmental impacts of these new energy sources also require to be quantified in order to review how many benefits these new technologies have for the environment. In this project the use of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) will be implemented in order to quantify the environmental impact of wave energy, an LCA is a technique for assessing various aspects with the development of a product and its potential impact throughout a product’s life (ISO 14040, 1997). Several renewables have been assessed for their environmental impact using this tool (wind power, biofuels, photovoltaic panels, among others). This project will be focused on the study of wave power, specifically devices called point absorbers.At the beginning this thesis offers a description of the Life Cycle Assessment methodology with a brief explanation of each steps and requirements according to the ISO 14000 Standard. Later a description of different wave energy technologies is explained, along with the classification of different devices depending on its location and its form of harvesting energy. After explaining the different types available at the moment, the thesis will focus on the point absorber device and explain an approach that can be taken in order to simplify the complexity of the whole system.Once the device is fully explained the thesis approaches the methodology pursued in order to evaluate the system in terms of environmental impact in the selected category, for this case global warming. After, an evaluation of the different modules from the wave energy converter in terms of its environmental impact and choosing the best conditions in order to reduce it has being done.At the end of the thesis an economical overview of building wave energy converters is considered among its monetized cost to the environment and a comparison of this new technologies among other renewables in the market is done, in order to have an overview of the potential this type of energy can have.The main research question to be answered by this master thesis is how competitive is wave energy among other renewable technologies available at the moment. Since at the moment wave energy is in its early stages a representation of how other renewables had advanced from its early stages until today is presented, and the potential of this type of energy is evaluated in environmental and economic figures showing competitive results that can further be improved.
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Francois, Du Toit. "Strategies to overcome challenges when implementing an Enterprise Engineering Innovation Life-cycle." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/29184.
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The delivery of innovative IT solutions that support business strategy is an increasing, growing competitive aspect of organisations in the financial sector. Previous research has shown the need to follow an innovative or a more agile and flexible methodology when delivering IT solutions to save cost and enable the solutions to reach the consumer market as soon as possible. To apply agile/innovative methodologies across large organisations requires more alternative approaches than to implement them in small enterprises. The organisation used in the case study, implemented an enterprise engineering innovative lifecycle (EEILC). Limited research has been done concerning the challenges and strategies during implementation of an EEILC. The purpose of this study was to investigate the strategies to overcome the challenges when implementing an EEILC. The research was inductive qualitative following an in-depth case study approach. The researcher conducted a case study using documentation analysis, informal interviews, in-depth interviews and observations with multiple stakeholders who are experts in their fields of software design and development. An inductive grounded theory approach was followed using a case study within an organisation in the financial sector in South Africa. Results show there are seven core category challenges when implementing an innovation life cycle. Each of these core challenges has a core enterprise strategy to address the challenges occurring in the applicable domain. The core challenges are: (1) innovation process challenges (addressed by an agile product delivery innovation strategy) (2) invention challenges (addressed by an idea management strategy) (3) business model challenges (addressed by a client’s value proposition strategy), (4) commercialization challenges, which include implementation and operations challenges, (addressed by a product portfolio management strategy), (5) culture challenges (addressed by an innovation culture strategy) and (6) knowledge management challenges and strategy, and (7) innovation management related challenges and strategy An innovation management strategy will manage all these challenges. Most prominent is the innovation management strategy which has links to all other categories in other domains. The relationship between enterprise client value proposition strategy show that enterprise client value proposition serves as a coherent link between how the innovation life cycle is adopted or changed to address the enterprise client value chain. This is driven by demand management to align between business and IT regarding the business model and application portfolio alignment. Thereafter, the alignment between the demand for enterprise application capabilities and the business service portfolio is shown. This is supported by service-oriented architecture (SOA) services. The resource management has to make sure the right resources, competencies and skills are available to deliver the product portfolio. During innovation and life-cycle's execution, there is a lot of interaction between individuals and teams. Therefore, communication and culture play a vital role to create synergies by collaboration of work practice and living the values of the organization. Through grounded theory analysis, a practical theory was developed, to show how challenges that occur during implementation of an innovation life-cycle, based upon enterprise engineering principles, can be addressed by best by putting the right strategies in place. This theory contributes to the body of knowledge by providing data and analysis from practical insight into how an innovation life cycle can be implemented. The challenges thereof and the mitigating strategies make it work. This study also suggested the key re best practices for enterprise architecture driving such an implementation. The research is an area of interest for development or customizing an Innovation Life-cycle using an Enterprise Engineering Framework.
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Bouchouireb, Hamza. "Advancing the life cycle energy optimisation methodology." Licentiate thesis, KTH, VinnExcellence Center for ECO2 Vehicle design, 2019. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-265556.
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The Life Cycle Energy Optimisation (LCEO) methodology aims at finding a design solution that uses a minimum amount of cumulative energy demand over the different phases of the vehicle's life cycle, while complying with a set of functional constraints. This effectively balances trade-offs, and therewith avoids sub-optimal shifting between the energy demand for the cradle-to-production of materials, operation of the vehicle, and end-of-life phases. This work further develops the LCEO methodology and expands its scope through three main methodological contributions which, for illustrative purposes, were applied to a vehicle sub-system design case study. An End-Of-Life (EOL) model, based on the substitution with a correction factor method, is included to estimate the energy credits and burdens that originate from EOL vehicle processing. Multiple recycling scenarios with different levels of assumed induced recyclate material property degradation were built, and their impact on the LCEO methodology's outcomes was compared to that of scenarios based on landfilling and incineration with energy recovery. The results show that the inclusion of EOL modelling in the LCEO methodology can alter material use patterns and significantly effect the life cycle energy of the optimal designs. Furthermore, the previous model is expanded to enable holistic vehicle product system design with the LCEO methodology. The constrained optimisation of a vehicle sub-system, and the design of a subset of the processes which are applied to it during its life cycle, are simultaneously optimised for a minimal product system life cycle energy. In particular, a subset of the EOL processes' parameters are considered as continuous design variables with associated barrier functions that control their feasibility. The results show that the LCEO methodology can be used to find an optimal design along with its associated ideal synthetic EOL scenario. Moreover, the ability of the method to identify the underlying mechanisms enabling the optimal solution's trade-offs is further demonstrated. Finally, the functional scope of the methodology is expanded through the inclusion of shape-related variables and aerodynamic drag estimations. Here, vehicle curvature is taken into account in the LCEO methodology through its impact on the aerodynamic drag and therewith its related operational energy demand. In turn, aerodynamic drag is considered through the estimation of the drag coefficient of a vehicle body shape using computational fluid dynamics simulations. The aforementioned coefficient is further used to estimate the energy required by the vehicle to overcome aerodynamic drag. The results demonstrate the ability of the LCEO methodology to capitalise on the underlying functional alignment of the structural and aerodynamic requirements, as well as the need for an allocation strategy for the aerodynamic drag energy within the context of vehicle sub-system redesign. Overall, these methodological developments contributed to the exploration of the ability of the LCEO methodology to handle life cycle and functional trade-offs to achieve life cycle energy optimal vehicle designs.Livscykelenergioptimerings-metodologin (LCEO) syftar till att hitta en designlösning som använder en minimal mängd av energi ackumulerat över de olika faserna av en produkts (i detta arbete i formen av ett fordon) livscykel, samtidigt som den uppfyller en förutbestämd uppsättning funktionella begränsningar. Genom detta kan avvägningar balanseras effektivt, och därmed undviks suboptimala förskjutningar mellan energibehovet för vagga-till-produktion av material, fordonets användningsfas samt hantering av det uttjänta fordonet, på engelska kallad End-Of-Life (EOL). Detta arbete vidareutvecklar LCEO-metodologin och utvidgar dess omfattning genom tre huvudsakliga metodologiska bidrag, som, för illustrativa syften, har applicerats på en fallstudie av ett fordons sub-systemdesign. En EOL-modell baserad på substitution med korrigeringsfaktorer, är inkluderad för att uppskatta energikrediter och bördor som härrör från hanteringen av det uttjänta fordonet. Flera olika scenarier som beskriver återvinning med olika nivåer av antagen degradering av egenskaper hos de återvunna materialen har definierats, och deras respektive LCEO utfall har jämförts med motsvarande resultat för scenarier baserade på deponering och förbränning med energiåtervinning. Resultaten visar att införandet av en EOL-modell i LCEO-metodologin kan ändra flöden och mönster kring materialanvändning och har en signifikant påverkan på den totala livscykelenergin i de optimala fordonsdesignen Då valet av EOL-modell har signifikans för LCEO utfallet, har de föregående, statiska modellerna kompletterats med en utvidgning mot en mer holistisk systemstudie utifrån LCEO. I denna utvidgning studeras frågor kring optimerade produktsystem, framförallt avseende en delmängd av EOL processernas parametrar som har inkluderats i form av kontinuerliga designvariabler med antagna barriärfunktioner som modellerar deras genomförbarhet. Resultaten visar att LCEO kan användas för att finna den optimala designen av en fordonskomponent tillsammans med dess associerade, ideala, syntetiska EOL-scenario. Dessutom demonstreras metodens förmåga att identifiera de underliggande mekanismer som möjliggör den optimala lösningens avvägningar. För att utöka komplexiteten i de ansatta funktionella begränsningarna har även form-relaterade variabler och aerodynamiska motståndsberäkningar tagits med. I det här fallet används krökningen på den studerade fordonskomponenten som ytterligare en variabel i LCEO analyser, med dess inverkan på det aerodynamiska motståndet och i och med detta variationer i användningsfasens energibehov. I detta fallet har det aerodynamiska motståndet tagits med i analysen genom uppskattning av motståndskoefficienten av en fordonskomponent framtagen genom strömningsmekaniska beräkningar. Denna uppskattning används sedan för att modellera den energi som krävs av fordonet för att övervinna det aerodynamiska luftmotståndet. I detta sammanhang visas också på behovet av en strategi för allokering av den aerodynamiska motståndsenergin hos en sub-komponent i relation till helheten, när fokus ligger på design av ett sub-system hos ett fordon. Resultaten visar att LCEO beskriver den underliggande funktionella synergin mellan de ansatta strukturella och de aerodynamiska kraven. Detta arbete bidrar till att LCEO utvecklas i flera olika avseenden som utgör väsentliga steg mot en pro-aktiv metod som kan hantera livscykel- och funktionella avvägningar i en optimal fordonsdesign ur ett livscykelenergiperspektiv.
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Ural, Hasan. "An approach to life-cycle testing of communication protocols." Thesis, University of Ottawa (Canada), 1985. http://hdl.handle.net/10393/4689.
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Li, Xiu Hong 1976. "Life cycle cost of support poles in distribution lines." Thesis, McGill University, 2004. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=81551.
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Wood poles are the most common support structures for distribution lines in North America. Wood poles typically have a service life of 40-50 years but may be replaced prematurely when they fail or are damaged by climatic loads or when they have degraded prematurely. The distribution network of Hydro-Quebec comprises more than 2 million wood poles and the selection of an optimal class of poles for new or refurbished lines can potentially represent significant savings. In this project, wood poles from class 1 to 5 and steel poles are considered for new or refurbished lines using life-cycle-cost analysis.The evaluation of life-cycle-costs of a line for a service life of 50 years was performed in two steps. A reliability model was first developed to estimate the probability of failure of single poles with climatic loads. The results of the reliability analysis were then integrated in an economic model that computes the Net Present Value of construction costs and pole replacement costs associated with failure under climatic loads of the whole line. Maintenance costs were neglected in this study since they were determined to be approximately similar for the various classes of poles.
The results indicate that the Class 4 poles that are currently used for the distribution network are not optimal from an economic point of view. For distribution lines located in regions with moderate ice hazard expositions, a Class 2 pole has a 15% cost advantage over the Class 4 poles. For distribution lines located in regions with severe ice hazard expositions, a Class 2 pole has a 30% advantage over the Class 4 poles.
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Nowicki, David R. "Reliability allocation and apportionment : addressing redundancy and life-cycle cost /." Thesis, This resource online, 1993. http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-08042009-040416/.
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Lohse, Tim. "Life cycle assessment of a plus-energy house." Thesis, KTH, Hållbar utveckling, miljövetenskap och teknik, 2020. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-266478.
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Purpose: This study analyses the environmental impacts of a plus-energy house. Such buildings produce more energy in their use-phase than they consume, by generating energy with photovoltaic cells and saving energy via extensive insulation. The entire life cycle of the building is investigated form cradle to grave. The research focuses on the identification of environmental hotspots and the break-even time, after which the avoided burdens from the energy surplus even out the environmental impacts. Method: To answer the research questions, an ISO 14040 compliant environmental impact assessment (LCA) was conducted. It covers the raw material extraction, production and manufacturing of the building, the energy consumption by the inhabitants, the demolition and subsequent waste processing as well as the energy generation from the photovoltaic cells during 50 years lifetime. The life cycle impact assessment method was based on EN 15804 with seven impact categories: global warming potential, depletion potential of the stratospheric ozone, acidification potential of soil and water, eutrophication potential, formation potential of tropospheric ozone, abiotic depletion potential for non-fossil resources, and abiotic depletion potential for fossil resources. Results: The use-phase with energy generation and consumption dominates in all the impact categories except for the stratospheric ozone depletion potential. Photovoltaic cell production has the largest impact in terms of resource and ozone depletion. The building does not set off its impacts with its avoided burdens during its lifetime. The break-even time is calculated for each impact category and starts at 654 years for global warming potential. The geometric standard deviation is calculated for every process, so that a Monte-Carlo simulation can be run. This makes it possible to calculate the standard deviation of the results. Discussion: It is possible to enhance the environmental performance of the building by focusing on the hotspots. A sensitivity analysis shows that enhancing the energy surplus during the use-phase would be the most effective measure. This could be achieved by increasing the photovoltaic cell area or decreasing the energy consumption.
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Avery, Greg M. "A Life Cycle Assessment of Ionic Liquid Pretreatment for Lignocellulosic Biomass." University of Toledo / OhioLINK, 2016. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=toledo1481273168926691.
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Fichana, Daniel. "Green engineering and gate-to gate life cycle assessments for pharmaceutical products /." Full text available online, 2005. http://www.lib.rowan.edu/find/theses.
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Zhao, Wei. "Feature-Based Hierarchical Knowledge Engineering for Aircraft Life Cycle Design Decision Support." Diss., Georgia Institute of Technology, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/1853/14639.
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The design process of aerospace systems is becoming more and more complex. As the process is progressively becoming enterprise-wide, it involves multiple vendors and encompasses the entire life-cycle of the system, as well as a system-of-systems perspective. The amount of data and information generated under this paradigm has increased exponentially creating a difficult situation as it pertains to data storage, management, and retrieval. Furthermore, the data themselves are not suitable or adequate for use in most cases and must be translated into knowledge with a proper level of abstraction. Adding to the problem is the fact that the knowledge discovery process needed to support the growth of data in aerospace systems design has not been developed to the appropriate level. In fact, important design decisions are often made without sufficient understanding of their overall impact on the aircraft's life, because the data have not been efficiently converted and interpreted in time to support design.
In order to make the design process adapt to the life-cycle centric requirement, this thesis proposes a methodology to provide the necessary supporting knowledge for better design decision making. The primary contribution is the establishment of a knowledge engineering framework for design decision support to effectively discover knowledge from the existing data, and efficiently manage and present the knowledge throughout all phases of the aircraft life-cycle. The second contribution is the proposed methodology on the feature generation and exploration, which is used to improve the process of knowledge discovery process significantly. In addition, the proposed work demonstrates several multimedia-based approaches on knowledge presentation.
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KHADILKAR, YOGESH SUDHIR Mr. "REVERSE SUPPLY CHAIN: LIFE CYCLE INVENTORY ANALYSIS." University of Cincinnati / OhioLINK, 2004. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1098665167.
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Simon, Scott James. "The recursive multi-threaded software life-cycle." CSUSB ScholarWorks, 1997. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project/1306.
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Vandehei, Bailey R. "Leveraging Defects Life-Cycle for Labeling Defective Classes." DigitalCommons@CalPoly, 2019. https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/theses/2111.
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Data from software repositories are a very useful asset to building dierent kinds of
models and recommender systems aimed to support software developers. Specically,
the identication of likely defect-prone les (i.e., classes in Object-Oriented systems)
helps in prioritizing, testing, and analysis activities. This work focuses on automated
methods for labeling a class in a version as defective or not. The most used methods
for automated class labeling belong to the SZZ family and fail in various circum-
stances. Thus, recent studies suggest the use of aect version (AV) as provided by
developers and available in the issue tracker such as JIRA. However, in many cir-
cumstances, the AV might not be used because it is unavailable or inconsistent. The
aim of this study is twofold: 1) to measure the AV availability and consistency in
open-source projects, 2) to propose, evaluate, and compare to SZZ, a new method
for labeling defective classes which is based on the idea that defects have a stable
life-cycle in terms of proportion of versions needed to discover the defect and to x
the defect. Results related to 212 open-source projects from the Apache ecosystem,
featuring a total of about 125,000 defects, show that the AV cannot be used in the
majority (51%) of defects. Therefore, it is important to investigate automated meth-
ods for labeling defective classes. Results related to 76 open-source projects from the
Apache ecosystem, featuring a total of about 6,250,000 classes that are are aected
by 60,000 defects and spread over 4,000 versions and 760,000 commits, show that the
proposed method for labeling defective classes is, in average among projects and de-
fects, more accurate, in terms of Precision, Kappa, F1 and MCC than all previously
proposed SZZ methods. Moreover, the improvement in accuracy from combining SZZ
with defects life-cycle information is statistically signicant but practically irrelevant
(
overall and in average, more accurate via defects' life-cycle than any SZZ method.
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Swei, Omar Abdullah. "Incorporating uncertainty in the Life Cycle Cost Analysis of pavements." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/78541.
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Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering; and, (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, 2012.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-87).
Life Cycle Cost Analysis (LCCA) is an important tool to evaluate the economic performance of alternative investments for a given project. It considers the total cost to construct, maintain, and operate a pavement over its expected life-time. Inevitably, input parameters in an LCCA are subject to a high level of uncertainty, both in the short-term and long-term. Under its current implementation in the field, however, LCCA inputs are treated as static, deterministic values. Conducting such an analysis, although computationally simpler, hides the underlying uncertainty of the inputs by only considering a few possible permutations. This suggests that although computationally simpler, the answer from the analysis may not necessarily be the correct one. One methodology to account for uncertainty is to treat input parameters as probabilistic values, allowing the analysis to consider a range of possible outcomes. There are two major reasons as to why probabilistic LCCAs, although recommended, have not been streamlined into practice. First, the LCCA of construction projects is a large-scale problem with many input parameters with a high-level of uncertainty. Second, there is a significant gap in research that statistically quantifies uncertainty for input values. This research addresses the latter point by statistically quantifying four types of uncertainty: the unit cost of construction, quantity of material inputs, occurrence of maintenance activities, and a particular emphasis is placed upon characterizing the evolution of material prices over time. Having statistically characterized uncertainty in the LCCA analysis, the application of the probabilistically derived inputs is illustrated in three scenarios. Pavement alternative designs are derived for a set of traffic conditions in a given location. The results of the analysis indicate the integration of probabilistic input parameters in the LCCA process allows for more robust conclusions when evaluating alternative pavement designs. Additionally, the case study shows treating input parameters probabilistically could potentially alter the pavement selection, and one parameter that greatly influences this is material-specific price projections.
by Omar Abdullah Swei.
S.M.
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El, Mostafa Mayce (Mayce A. ). "The life cycle assessment of concrete manufacturing in Kuwait." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/82812.
Full textAbstract:
Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2013.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 67-70).
Concrete is the second most widely used material in the world after water. Annually 9,120 million tons of concrete are produced, which is an equivalent of 1.3 tons of concrete per individual. As the world's primary construction material, significant research regarding the strength and durability of concrete has been performed over the years. Recent research, however, is shifting towards the exploration of the sustainability of concrete and its contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions. The recent increase of construction projects in Kuwait in combination with the desire of decreasing fuel usage has led the Kuwait government and people to shift their attention towards the environment and its impacts. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is developed to assist in the quantification of the environmental impacts of specific products or services. This thesis focuses on the life cycle assessment of concrete manufacturing in Kuwait. The study is based on a range of concrete mixes and follows the standard protocols of the ISO 14040 and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP). The LCA concentrates on the embodied energy of the concrete material and does not consider the utilization phases. The impact assessment of the LCA is based on the global warming potential, mainly the equivalent carbon dioxide emissions of the concrete mixture. The manufacturing of concrete in Kuwait is estimated to generate 470-530 kg of CO₂ per cubic meter of concrete; which is considered high when compared to concrete CO₂ emissions in the US, Sweden and Italy. The final outcome demonstrates that the variable that contributes the most to the environmental impact of concrete in Kuwait is the energy used in the production of cement and water desalination. Possible solutions for reduction of environmental impacts are the use of renewable resources and the recycling of aggregates.
by Mayce El Mostafa.
M.Eng.
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DeGolyer, Jessica Suzanne. "Fuel Life-Cycle Analysis of Hydrogen vs. Conventional Transportation Fuels." NCSU, 2008. http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/theses/available/etd-08192008-124223/.
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Fuel life-cycle analyses were performed to compare the affects of hydrogen on annual U.S. light-duty transportation emissions in future year 2030. Five scenarios were developed assuming a significant percentage of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to compare different feedstock fuels and technologies to produce hydrogen. The five hydrogen scenarios are: Central Natural Gas, Central Coal Gasification, Central Thermochemical Nuclear, Distributed Natural Gas, and Distributed Electrolysis. The Basecase used to compare emissions was the Annual Energy Outlook 2006 Report that estimated vehicle and electricity mix in year 2030. A sixth scenario, High Hybrid, was included to compare vehicle technologies that currently exist to hydrogen fuel cell vehicles that commercially do not exist. All hydrogen scenarios assumed 30% of the U.S. light-duty fleet to be hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in year 2030. Energy, greenhouse emissions, and criteria pollutant emissions including volatile organic compounds, particulate matter, sulfur dioxides, nitrogen dioxides, and carbon monoxide were evaluated. Results show that the production of hydrogen using thermochemical nuclear technology is the most beneficial in terms of energy usage, greenhouse gas emissions, and criteria pollutant emissions. Energy usage decreased by 36%, greenhouse gas emissions decreased by 46% or 9.6 x 108 tons, and criteria emissions were reduced by 28-47%. The centrally-produced hydrogen scenarios proved to be more energy efficient and overall release fewer emissions than the distributed hydrogen production scenarios. The only hydrogen scenario to show an increase in urban pollution is the Distributed Natural Gas scenario with a 60% increase in SOx emissions..
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Huang, Jessica J. "Life cycle analysis of hybrid poplar trees for cellulosic ethanol." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/40429.
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Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 38-41).
The main purpose of this paper is to assess the energy and environmental benefits of cultivating hybrid poplars as a biomass crop for cellulosic ethanol. A "Life Cycle Assessment" (LCA) methodology is used to systematically evaluate the hybrid poplar's energy input and output as well as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The system boundary is divided into three sections, agriculture, transportation, and ethanol processing. In this LCA, only energy from fossil fuels is accounted for, and only energy yield from ethanol yield is considered. Energy demands and associated emissions for all operations are divided equally over the total biomass harvested over a 10 year timeline. Ultimately, the net energy ratio, the amount of clean energy produced over the amount of fossil fuels consumed, and the amount of carbon dioxide emitted during the cultivation process is compared to those of current forms of fuel and other renewable resources. The net energy ratio was calculated to be in the range of 5.82 to 8.55, which was found to be higher than both gasoline and corn ethanol.
(cont.) The carbon dioxide emission was calculated to be in the range of 2.42 to 3.55 grams CO2 per MJ output, and was lower than the net emissions of both gasoline and corn ethanol. However, in comparing to other renewable resources, such as solar and wind, hybrid poplars were evaluated to be less optimal in energy efficiency and GHG emissions.
by Jessica J. Huang.
S.B.
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Arthur, Daniel Tettey. "Hybrid thermodynamic life cycle assessment of gasoline and ethanol blends." The Ohio State University, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1406030567.
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Theka, Edward. "A life cycle assessment of ethanol produced from sugarcane molasses." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/5393.
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The environmental performance of production companies is increasingly becoming part of strategies for the competitive marketing of their products, as consumers grow more aware of environmental issues surrounding industry. Similar products can be compared by the tool of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) from the perspective of their impacts on the environment from which their production resources are drawn and to which their burdens are released. There is the inherent perception that products made from renewable resources are environmentally more desirable than those which are produced from finite resources. This thesis investigates whether this conception is valid for the case of ethanol produced from biomass, by describing and interpreting the various stages of the production process by means of an LCA. Sugarcane (Saccharum o/ficinarum) contains 12 - 17% sugars on a wet basis, and 68 -72% moisture. The sugar composition is 90% sucrose and 10% glucose or fructose. In the conventional sugar production industry, syrup containing about 34% sucrose (molasses) remains after sugar crystals are formed from the clarified juice. This sucrose can be fermented to produce ethanol whose uses include potable consumption and the production of chemicals, but there is growing interest in its possible use as an additive for motor-grade gasoline, as well as its use as neat fuel to replace crude-oil based fuels. This thesis presents a cradle to gate life cycle study carried out with the aim of determining the environmental consequences of producing ethanol from sugarcane molasses. The investigation was done for a sugar producing company in the Kwa-Zulu Natal Province of South Africa, whose interests also lie in the beneficiation of value addition products from sugarcane. The goal of the study was to produce a comprehensive inventory of all the energy and material inputs and outputs involved in the production of the 1 kl (1000 litres) of bio-ethanol, using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Concepts of carbon closure and fossil energy ratio were chosen to represent measures of the degree of renewability of the system, and the results were compared to values derived from the literature on life cycle assessments of similar bioenergysystems.
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KUMAR, AMIT, and SAMY AMIRTHALINGAM MUTHU. "ISO 14001:2015 Life Cycle Perspective." Thesis, Högskolan i Halmstad, Akademin för ekonomi, teknik och naturvetenskap, 2020. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:hh:diva-42194.
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Our research is based on data triangulation methodology by which we are going to answer the question with a combination of two elements: the design and development in combination with life cycle perspective according to ISO 14001:2015 and organization consider the life cycle perspective when they design and develop their products, in a modified form introducing many new aspects of life-cycle thinking. This Master’sthesis aims to discuss the Sustainability approach through the use of Environmental Management Standards (EMS), the results achieved by organizations that implement and certify those EMS, and a special focus on the current process of ISO 14001:2015 revision and the logic behind it. Revisiting the concept of Sustainability, the status of the International Organization for Standardization 14001, requirements that related to that life cycle perspective in ISO 14001:2015, eco-design, circular economy and its expected outcomes are discussed. The ISO 14001:2015 revision will have major impacts on the more than 300,000 worldwide certified organizations and on the many professionals that work with it. Analysis of the development of a sustainability portfolio within a globally-operating manufacturing company, we came different illustrate the kinds of life cycle work involved in dealing with activities and interests, connecting activities and interests into action-nets, performing life cycle practices, and spreading the life cycle idea. Finally, we discuss implications of life cycle work for research in the field of organization and management studies and questions related to the topic with quality engineers within the organization.
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Kamara, John Musa. "Client requirements processing for concurrent life-cycle design and construction." Thesis, Teesside University, 1999. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.365454.
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Shetye, Nitish. "Life-Cycle Energy Analysis of a High Strength Steel Application." Thesis, KTH, Lättkonstruktioner, 2020. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-290157.
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Steel is one of the most important engineering and construction material. It is used everywhere around us from making tiny nuts and bolts to massive cargo ships. It is a basic component in building societies and the development of mankind. The demand of steel is influenced by the population of the world and the per-capita consumption.
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Carmona, David Isaac. "Quantifying the Life Cycle Benefits of Performance-Based Design in Sustainable Design." DigitalCommons@CalPoly, 2012. https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/theses/708.
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ABSTRACT
Quantifying the Life Cycle Benefits of Performance-Based Design in Sustainable Design
David Carmona
For this thesis, a method is developed and tested for use with performance based design to quantify the sustainable and financial benefits of designing buildings to a structural performance level higher than Life-Safety. This paper starts to answer the question, “which would be a better investment: build structures to a performance level of Immediate Occupancy (IO) with the likelihood of less damage and downtime after an earthquake or continue to build to the building code’s implied minimum performance level of Life-Safety (LS)?”
An ASCE 7-05 designed base model building (six-story, steel moment frame, office located in San Francisco) was designed to meet the minimum requirements of the LS or stricter code requirements of the IO performance objectives, respectively. Performance levels were verified using the ASCE 41-06 linear static procedures and ETABS models.
The overall cost and cost difference for building the two structures were determined using RSMeans reference manuals. The structural upgrade cost from LS to IO is roughly 1.6% of the $33.4 million initial building cost for a total of approximately $500,000.
The financial damage caused to the two buildings due to a series of earthquakes was determined using the ATC-58 Guidelines and the modeling capabilities of its companion software Performance Assessment and Calculation Tool (PACT). Due to PACT’s work-in-progress status and limited quantity of fragility curves representing building components, results are questionable and expected to become more fine-tuned as the software develops and there is an increased availability of fragility curves.
Using the PACT program, the difference in annualized loss between the IO and LS buildings was determined to be roughly $40,000. This is equivalent to a 2009 present cost of $590,000 over a 50-year building lifespan. By designing the building to an IO performance level, the owner potentially saves 18% ($590,000 loss to future seismic damages/ $500,000 cost to upgrade) over the life-span of the building. As buildings begin to incorporate state-of-the-art, more expensive and efficient components, designing higher performing structures to protect these upfront costs will prove more beneficial than repairing the components at a future date. Considering building downtime and loss of life would increase the value of savings and provide an additional incentive to design a structure directly to a higher performance level.
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Wagner, Alixandra. "Toxicity Evaluations of Nanoclays and an Associated Nanocomposite throughout Their Life Cycle." Thesis, West Virginia University, 2018. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=10977044.
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Nanoclays are layered mineral silicates that originate from the clay fraction of soil and carry a platelet thickness of about 1 nm and lengths and widths of up to several microns. Due to their nanoscale dimensions, they have been used for numerous applications ranging from media for oil well drilling to sorbents in treatment of waste-water. Additionally, upon functionalization with organic modifiers, nanoclays have been incorporated into polymers to form nanocomposites with increased mechanical strength, barrier properties, UV dispersion, and fire resistance to be implemented in food packaging or medical devices related applications. Such increased implementation into industrial and commercial products has brought scrutiny onto nanoclays and associated nanocomposites toxicity. Previous studies have shown for instance that nanoclays induce cytotoxic and genotoxic effects upon cellular or model animal exposure, however little investigations were performed to identify how nanoclay functionalization may influence such toxicological profiles. Moreover, most of the studies related to nanoclays and nanocomposites toxicity only refer to their consumption/usage exposure and fail to assess manufacturing or disposal exposures.
Herein, we aimed to understand how the physical and chemical properties of nanoclay systems (i.e. pristine and organically modified, along with a nanoclay-enforced nanocomposite) in both their as-received (mimicking manufacturing) and thermally degraded (mimicking end of life cycle incineration) forms influence lung cells, used to model inhalation toxicity. Physical and chemical properties of the materials were investigated via microscopical and spectroscopical approaches, while toxicity profiles were assessed both in real-time or at disparate time points via in vitro cellular and molecular assays, cell imaging, and electric cell-substrate impedance sensing. Our analyses showed that nanoclays and nanocomposites properties (both physical and chemical) influence the materials’ degradation profile and ultimately their induced toxicity in model cellular systems. The toxic effects were displayed either by reductions in cell proliferation and viability, changes in cell morphology, and/or alterations in the cell cytoskeleton. Overall, our results provide unique insights into how materials properties, both physical and chemical dictate materials’ toxicological profiles throughout their life cycle (from manufacturing to disposal) with such information to be possibly aiding in safe-by-design strategies as well as safety protocols implementation in areas of exposure.
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Lökholm, Alvestad Ragnvald. "Life Cycle Assessments as a front-end Systems Engineering tool in ship design." Thesis, KTH, Marina system, 2012. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-102049.
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Environmental impact analyses have not been popular in ship design due to the complexity of both the analysis itself and the ship system. This study proposes a framework for life cycle assessments (LCA) for ship design, using a foundation in systems engineering to position the assessment method in the design process. By limiting the analysis to comparing the differences between design alternatives and accepting lower result precision, the effort and level of expertise required is significantly reduced. Reducing the requirement on precision allows for approximate input data as well, enabling the naval architect to use simple methods, e.g. the Holtrop-Mennen method, to provide input data. Despite this imprecision, it is shown that one can observe trends in the result that point toward a design concept with lower impact than its contestors. Further, one must select an evaluation model and database, both determined by experts, that support the analysis well, and a software to present the naval architect with an interface with which he can easily interact. The benefits of such simplified analyses are that little LCA expertise is required, only a few parameters must be modelled and most of the input data is determined, allbeit approximately, through the initial regular ship design process and is readily available. The pitfalls are a low degree of transparency due to the evaluation model and risk for misinterpretation and misuse of the results because of the limit on modelled parameters and assessment precision. Using this framework, with its limitations, lowers the threshold to implementing an LCA as a design review tool in early design stages, a front-end tool, allowing the environmental assessment to affect earlier design decisions in a greater extent than today.
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Maleki, Elaheh. "A Systems Engineering-based semantic model to support “Product-Service System” life cycle." Thesis, Ecole centrale de Nantes, 2018. http://www.theses.fr/2018ECDN0064/document.
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Les Systèmes Produit-Service (PSS) résultent d'une intégration de composants hétérogènes couvrant à la fois des aspects matériels et immatériels (mécanique, électrique,logiciel, processus, organisation, etc.). Le processus de développement d’un PSS est fortement collaboratif impliquant des acteurs métier très variés.Ce caractère interdisciplinaire nécessite des référentiels sémantiques standardisés pour gérer la multitude des points de vue métier et faciliter l’intégration de tous les composants hétérogènes dans un système unique. Ceci est encore plus complexe dans le cas des PSS personnalisables, majoritaires dans le milieu industriel. Malgré les nombreuses méthodologies dans littérature, la gestion des processus de développement du PSS reste encore limitée face à cette complexité. Dans ce contexte, l'Ingénierie des systèmes (IS) pourrait être une solution avantageuse au regard de ses qualités bien prouvé pour la modélisation et la gestion de systèmes complexes. Cette thèse vise à explorer le potentiel d'utilisation de l'Ingénierie des systèmes (IS) comme fondement conceptuel pour représenter d’une façon intégrée tous les différents points de vue métier associés au cycle de vie du PSS. Dans ce cadre, un méta-modèle de PSS est proposé et exemplifié dans des cas industriels. Un modèle ontologique est aussi présenté comme une application d’une partie des modèles pour structurer le référentiel commun de la plateforme ICP4LifeProduct-service systems (PSS) result from the integration of heterogeneous components covering both tangible and intangible aspects(mechanical, electrical, software, process, organization, etc.). The process of developing PSS is highly collaborative involving a wide variety of stakeholders. This interdisciplinary nature requires standardized semantic repositories to handle the multitude of business views and facilitate the integration of all heterogeneous components into a single system. This is even more complex in the case of customizable PSS in the industrial sector. Despite the many methodologies in literature, the management of the development processes of the PSS is still limited to face this complexity. In this context, Systems Engineering (SE) could bean advantageous solution in terms of its proven qualities for the modeling and management of complex systems. This thesis aims at exploring the potentials of Systems Engineering (SE) as a conceptual foundation to represent various different business perspectives associated with the life cycle of the PSS. In this context, a meta-model for PSS is proposed and verified in industrial cases. An ontological model is also presented as an application of a part of the model to structure the common repository of the ICP4Life platform
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Loijos, Alex (Alexander Nikos). "Life cycle assessment of concrete pavements : impacts and opportunities." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/65431.
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Thesis (S.M. in Technology and Policy)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Engineering Systems Division, Technology and Policy Program, 2011.This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.
Cataloged from student submitted PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 118-121).
The concrete pavement network in the United States plays a crucial role in the economy by enabling the transport of people and goods, but it also leads to resource consumption and environmental impacts. This thesis is fundamentally motivated to reduce the impact that concrete pavements have on climate change. The principal methodology that is used is life cycle assessment (LCA), which comprehensively includes all five primary phases of the life cycle: materials extraction and production, pavement construction, pavement rehabilitation, the use phase, and end-of-life recycling and disposal. This work informs the reduction of life cycle greenhouse gases (GHGs) through a three-pronged approach to: 1) comprehensively quantify GHG emissions for structures representing all primary pavement types in the US, 2) establishes a benchmark for GHG emissions from all concrete pavements in the US constructed annually, and 3) identifies five reduction strategies and measures the GHG reduction that is obtainable through these strategies, both at the project-level for different road classes and at the national level. This provides a portfolio of GHG reduction options to national and regional policymakers, transportation agencies, and pavement engineers.
by Alex Loijos.
S.M.in Technology and Policy
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Zhang, Jingyi. "A Life Cycle Sustainability Study of Perovskite Solar Cell Technologies." Case Western Reserve University School of Graduate Studies / OhioLINK, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1554289816394232.
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Yu, Bin. "Environmental Implications of Pavements: A Life Cycle View." Scholar Commons, 2013. http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/etd/4619.
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Environmental aspect of pavement, unlike its economic counterpart, is seldom considered in the theoretical study and field practices. As a highly energy and material intensive infrastructure, pavement has great potential to contribute to the environment protection, which, in root, depends on the in-depth understanding of the environmental impacts, holistically and specifically. A life cycle assessment (LCA) model is used to fulfill the goal.
This research firstly carried out extensive literature review of LCA studies on pavement to identify the major research gaps, including: incompleteness of the methodology, controversy of the functional unit, and unawareness of feedstock energy of asphalt, etc. Based on that, a comprehensive methodology to apply the LCA model in the context of pavement engineering was developed. The five-module methodology, including material module, maintenance and rehabilitation (M&R) module, construction module, congestion module, and end of life module, covers almost every stage of pavement for a life time. The unique contribution of the proposed methodology lies in the deep-going modeling of the congestion module due to construction and M&R activities and the great efforts on the usage module. Moreover, the proposed methodology is a complex structure, demanding many sub-models to enrich the model bank and therefore another three contributions are made accordingly. Specifically, the environmental damage costs (EDCs) were calculated based on the estimates of the marginal damage cost of involved air pollutants; a function describing the relationship of pavement roughness and average vehicle speed was established; and an improved pavement M&R optimization algorithm was developed with the incorporation of EDCs.
To demonstrate how the proposed methodology can be implemented, a case study of three overlay systems, including hot mixture asphalt (HMA), Portland cement concrete (PCC), and crack, seat and overlay (CSOL), was performed. Through the case study, the PCC option and CSOL options are found to have less environmental burdens as opposed to the HMA option while the comparison between the former two is indeterminate due to the great uncertainties associated with usage module, especially pavement structure effect; and the material, congestion, and usage modules are the three major sources of energy consumptions and air pollutant emissions. Traditionally, cost evaluation of pavement does not refer to EDC while the developed M&R optimization algorithm suggests that EDC occupies a significant fraction of the total cost constitution. And the M&R algorithm leads to a reduction from 8.2 to 12.3 percent and from 5.9 to 10.2 percent in terms of total energy consumptions and costs compared to the before optimization results.
On the other aspect, pavement communities seem to prefer long life pavement because they believe small increase of pavement thickness prolongs the service life and thus leads to a smaller marginal cost while the study in Chapter 5 suggests that it may not be always true, at least in terms environmental impacts. Specially, frequently used pavement designs in the U.S. of two design lives, 20 years and 40 years, at three levels of traffic, are evaluated for their environmental impacts using the proposed methodology. It is found that only at high traffic volumes, the 40-year designs carry environmental advantages over their 20-year counterparts while the opposite is true at the low or medium traffic volumes. Unfortunately, it is not possible to determine the watershed traffic volumes due to the disturbance of many external factors.
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Flager, Forest Lee 1978. "The design of building structures for improved life-cycle performance." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/29552.
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Thesis (M.Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2003.Includes bibliographical references (leaf 44).
Current structural design practice is primarily concerned with optimizing the construction cost and schedule of a building project, while ensuring that the structure meets basic safety and serviceability requirements. The maintenance costs, alteration/replacement costs, and end-of-life costs associated with the support of the structure after the initial construction process is given far less consideration. Initial research indicates that, for a typical building, the majority of the cost over the system life cycle is incurred after the original structure has been completed. The ultimate value and longevity of a building is, therefore, largely dependant on the ability of the structure to be economically maintained and easily modified during its service life. The objective of this paper is to outline a design process that considers how buildings interact with time. The process involves two fundamental steps: (1) the modularization of the structure to accommodate how different parts of the building change over time and (2) the design of modular components in consideration of their expected service life. Life cycle cost methods are applied to evaluate the performance of design alternatives-thus making it easier to explicitly consider the cost associated with how a structure will be supported and may be adapted over time, in addition to the customary tasks of calculating construction costs and schedules. Despite the apparent benefits to this approach, there are a number of obstacles preventing the adoption of life cycle design principles into professional practice. Specific obstacles to implementation are discussed with respect to the construction industries in both the United States and Japan. The paper concludes with the description of further case study research to be conducted in the Japan during the summer of 2003, the findings of which will be published as an addendum to this document.
by Forest Lee Flager.
M.Eng.
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Rampuria, Abhishek. "Enabling streamlined life cycle assessment : materials-classification derived structured underspecification." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/75852.
Full textAbstract:
Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering, 2012.This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.
Cataloged from student submitted PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 49-50).
As environmental footprint considerations for companies gain greater importance, the need for quantitative impact assessment tools such as life cycle assessment (LCA) has become a higher priority. Currently, the cost and time burden associated with LCA has prevented it from becoming more prevalent. While several streamlining approaches have been suggested, questions regarding the effectiveness and efficiency of the streamlined results are still of concern. The streamlining method of probabilistic underspecification has shown initial success in its ability to reduce LCA efforts while simultaneously increasing certainty in the final impact assessment. Probabilistic underspecification streamlines LCA by prioritizing targets of more refined data collection and by implementing the use of underspecified surrogate data within LCI analysis. This thesis concentrates on further developing and improving the streamlining methodology of probabilistic underspecification through refinement of the materials classification systems for polymers and minerals and through additional case study analysis. The classification system allows for a better understanding of the relationship between the degree of materials specificity and the uncertainty in the resulting impact values. Additionally, the resulting polymer and mineral classifications were combined with existing materials classifications to conduct an alkaline battery case study in order to test the effectiveness of the streamlining method. The material classifications created through this research provide a logical and practical approach to underspecification while maintaining consistent and reasonable levels of uncertainty. Furthermore, the case study analysis showed that the streamlining methodology significantly lowered LCA burden by systematically reducing the number of product components requiring full specification. This research provides further evidence that probabilistic underspecification may provide a promising LCA streamlining method among a set of such strategies that can significantly reduce LCA efforts while maintaining the accuracy of the overall impact assessment.
by Abhishek Rampuria.
S.B.
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Pang, Shih-Hao. "Life Cycle Inventory Incorporating Fuel Cycle and Real-World In-Use Measurement Data for Construction Equipment and Vehicles." NCSU, 2008. http://web.lib.ncsu.edu/theses/available/etd-12152007-080346/.
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Biodiesel is an alternative fuel that can be made from vegetable oils or animal fat. This study focuses on whether substitution of soy-based biodiesel fuels for petroleum diesel would produce an overall reduction in emissions of selected pollutants. A life cycle inventory model was developed to estimate energy consumption and emissions of selected pollutants and greenhouse gases. Real-world measurements using portable emission measurement system (PEMS) were made for 15 construction vehicles, including five backhoes, four front-end loaders, and six motor graders on both petroleum diesel and soy-based B20 biodiesel. These data are used as the basis for vehicle tailpipe emission factors of CO2, CO, HC, NOx, and PM. The results imply that biodiesel is a promising alternative fuel for diesel, but that there are some environmental trade-offs. Analysis of empirical data reveals that intra-vehicle variability of energy use and emissions is strongly influenced by vehicle activity that leads to variations in engine load, as represented by manifold absolute pressure (MAP). Vehicle-specific models for fuel use and tailpipe emissions were developed for each of the 30 construction vehicle. The time-based regression model has the highest explanatory ability among six models and is recommended in order to predict fuel use and emission rate for diesel-fueled nonroad construction equipment. Representative duty cycles for each type of vehicles were characterized by a frequency distribution of normalized manifold absolute pressure (MAP). In order to assess the variations of fuel use and emissions among different duty cycles, for a given engine, the inter-cycle variability is assessed. In order to assess the variations of fuel use and emissions among engines, for a given duty cycle, the inter-engine variability is assessed. The results indicated time-based inter-cycle and inter-engine variations of fuel use and emissions are significant. Fuel-based emission factors have less variability among cycles and engines than time-based emission factors. Fuel-based emission factors are more robust with respect to inter-engine and inter-cycle variations and are recommended in order to develop an emissions inventory for nonroad construction vehicles. Real-world in-use measurements should be a basis for developing duty cycle correction factors in models such as NONROAD.
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Safi, Mohammed. "Bridge Life Cycle Cost Optimization : Analysis, Evaluation & Implementation." Thesis, KTH, Civil and Architectural Engineering, 2009. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-11908.
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In infrastructure construction projects especially bridge investments, the most critical decisions that significantly affect the whole bridge LCC are the early stages decisions. Clearly, it's more beneficial to correctly choose the optimum bridge than to choose the optimum construction or repair method.
The ability of a bridge to provide service over time demands appropriate maintenance by the agency. Thus the investment decision should consider not only the initial activity that creates a public good, but also all future activities that will be required to keep that investment available to the public.
This research is aiming for bridge sustainability, enhance the bridge related decision making, and facilitate the usage of the bridge related feedbacks. The development of a reliable and usable computer tool for bridge LCC & LCA evaluation is the main target.
Toward the main goal, many steps were fulfilled. A unique integrated Bridge LCC evaluation methodology was developed. Two systematic evaluation ways were developed, one for bridge user cost and one for the bridge aesthetical and cultural value. To put these two systematic ways in practice, two preliminary computer programs were developed for this purpose. Today and future works are focusing on developing methodology and preliminary computer tool for bridge agency cost as well as the bridge LCA evaluation. KTH unique LCC evaluation system will enable the decision makers to correctly choose the optimum bridge in the early stages decision making phases as well as any later on reparation method.
ETSI
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Kere, Kiswendsida Jules. "Life-Cycle Cost Comparison of Corrosion Management Strategies for Steel Structures." University of Akron / OhioLINK, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1510185493551753.
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Moghtadernejad, Saviz. "Design, inspection, maintenance, life cycle performance and integrity of building facades." Thesis, McGill University, 2013. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=119656.
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Facades mounted on the exterior of buildings protect the interior from aggressive environments, besides contributing to their aesthetics and technical performance. Unfortunately, despite some serious facade failures involving some deaths and injuries, their inspection and maintenance, which are essential for public safety, have been generally ignored. On July 16, 2009, a large concrete facade element, weighing 320 kg, detached from the building structure of a Montreal hotel and fell on its exterior sidewalk cafe, instantaneously killing a young woman celebrating her birthday and injuring her husband. Some major U.S. cities, such as New York, Chicago and Boston have learnt from such tragedies, and nine American cities have enacted by-laws or ordnances requiring mandatory periodic facade inspections to ensure public safety. However, Canadian cities do not have similar stringent regulations to guide design, construction, maintenance and life-cycle performance of facades to ensure their safety over service life. The National Building Code of Canada (NBCC) includes safety provisions for building components which implement environmental separation; however, the NBCC and other relevant CSA standards do not deal adequately with the maintenance, performance and durability issues related to the performance of these facades. This research program is an attempt to develop and recommend strategies to minimize these risks through mandatory inspection and maintenance programs, and to eliminate similar tragedies from occurring in the future.Façades montés sur l'extérieur de bâtiments à protéger l'intérieur d'environnements agressifs, en plus de contribuer à leur esthétique et performances techniques. Malheureusement, malgré quelques ratés façade graves impliquant des morts et des blessés, leur inspection et d'entretien, qui sont essentiels pour la sécurité du public, ont été généralement ignorée. Le 16 Juillet 2009, un élément de façade en béton grand, pesant 320 kg, détaché de la structure du bâtiment d'un hôtel de Montréal et est tombé sur son café sur le trottoir extérieur, tuant instantanément une jeune femme fête son anniversaire et blessé son mari. Certaines grandes villes américaines, comme New York, Chicago et Boston ont appris de telles tragédies, et neuf villes américaines ont adopté des lois ou des munitions qui nécessitent des inspections obligatoires périodiques façade pour assurer la sécurité du public. Toutefois, les villes canadiennes n'ont pas similaires réglementations strictes pour guider les performances conception, la construction, l'entretien et du cycle de vie des façades pour assurer leur sécurité pendant la durée de vie. Le Code national du bâtiment du Canada (CNBC) comporte des dispositions de sécurité pour les éléments de construction qui mettent en œuvre la séparation de l'environnement, mais les normes du CNB et autres pertinentes de la CSA ne traite pas de manière adéquate les questions de maintenance, de performance et de durabilité liés à l'exécution de ces façades. Ce programme de recherche est une tentative d'élaborer et de recommander des stratégies pour minimiser ces risques par l'inspection obligatoire et des programmes de maintenance, et d'éliminer les tragédies semblables ne se reproduisent à l'avenir.
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Rajagopalan, Neethi. "Environmental life-cycle assessment of highway construction projects." Thesis, [College Station, Tex. : Texas A&M University, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/1969.1/ETD-TAMU-1465.
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