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REVIEW article

Front. Built Environ.
Sec. Bridge Engineering
Volume 10 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fbuil.2024.1410798

Life cycle assessment of the sustainability of bridges: Methodology and literature review

Provisionally accepted
Ivana Milić Ivana Milić 1*Jelena Bleiziffer Jelena Bleiziffer 2
  • 1 Smagra d.o.o., Zagreb, Croatia
  • 2 Faculty of Civil Engineering, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Analysing the entire project life cycle is a new trend in sustainability assessment in the construction sector. Research on sustainability issues in the construction sector started with issues related to buildings, while research for other structures such as infrastructure projects and bridges was not originally an integral part of the research. Therefore, the findings, knowledge and practical applications for buildings are more comprehensive than for infrastructure projects. This paper deals with the assessment of the sustainability of bridges throughout their life cycle and emphasises the importance of life cycle analysis of bridges in the early stages of planning and design. The study provides an overview of existing life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) methodologies for environmental (Life Cycle Assessment -LCA), economic (Life Cycle Cost -LCC) and social (Social -Life Cycle Analysis -S-LCA) aspects. This paper provides a critical overview of the current state of the art in the field of LCSA of bridges. To identify knowledge gaps, a review of the literature on LCSA of bridges is also provided, which performs a comparative life cycle analysis of different variants or components of the load-bearing structure of bridges. The main objective of the paper is to provide recommendations for conducting LCSA of bridges and to identify research directions for design criteria for sustainable bridges of the future.

    Keywords: Bridges, Life Cycle Assessment, life cycle cost, social-life cycle analysis, LCSA methods, functional unit, Climate Change, sustainability

    Received: 01 Apr 2024; Accepted: 26 Jun 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Milić and Bleiziffer. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ivana Milić, Smagra d.o.o., Zagreb, Croatia

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.