IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/endesu/v26y2024i5d10.1007_s10668-023-03446-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Life cycle assessment of residential building in Iran: a case study on construction phase and material impacts

Author

Listed:
  • Saeed Morsali

    (Gazi University)

  • Feriha Yildirim

    (Gazi University)

Abstract

Buildings are a basic requirement for human beings and an essential part of the built environment, with significant environmental impacts. In addition to their complex and diverse material use, buildings are expected to have a long lifespan, typically more than 50 years. This paper aims to evaluate the environmental performance of materials and construction activities for a typical residential building. Life cycle assessment methodology was applied using Simapro©software. A cradle-to-gate analysis was carried out. The results were analyzed based on the Ecoinvent 3.8 database and Eco-Indicator 99. The results show that reinforcing steel (21%) and concrete production (16%) are the most dominant processes, accounting for almost 37% of the overall environmental impact. Transportation also had an overall impact of around 15%. Brick production and use accounted for 11.23% of the overall impact, followed by lime mortar production (11%). Asphalt coating production and use had the 6th highest impact with 9.7% of the overall impact. Ceramic production accounted for 5% of the overall impact, followed by cut stone products with 3.58% of impact. Steel use, plaster mixing, excavation processes, laminate, fiberboard, paint, and glass production and use had around 7% of the overall impact in total. Besides, the resource depletion impact category showed the highest value among the three main impact categories. On the other hand, fossil fuels and respiratory inorganic impact categories were the most affected sub-impact categories among the 11 study impact categories. As material and designing codes, technology, and construction methods differ based on regions and countries, this paper demonstrates the importance of even smaller portions of materials such as Laminate production in the Land use and asphalt felt production in the Fossil fuels impact categories in, especially for countries with insufficient studies and databases for construction activities.

Suggested Citation

  • Saeed Morsali & Feriha Yildirim, 2024. "Life cycle assessment of residential building in Iran: a case study on construction phase and material impacts," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 26(5), pages 11653-11680, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:endesu:v:26:y:2024:i:5:d:10.1007_s10668-023-03446-z
    DOI: 10.1007/s10668-023-03446-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10668-023-03446-z
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10668-023-03446-z?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:endesu:v:26:y:2024:i:5:d:10.1007_s10668-023-03446-z. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.