IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v14y2022i14p8814-d866157.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Life Cycle Cost and Assessment of Alternative Railway Sleeper Materials

Author

Listed:
  • Samuel Thompson

    (Department of Civil and Construction Engineering, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn 3122, Australia)

  • Christopher King

    (Department of Civil and Construction Engineering, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn 3122, Australia)

  • John Rodwell

    (Department of Management & Marketing, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn 3122, Australia)

  • Scott Rayburg

    (Department of Civil and Construction Engineering, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn 3122, Australia)

  • Melissa Neave

    (School of Global, Urban and Social Studies, RMIT University, Melbourne 3001, Australia)

Abstract

Improvements in plastic recycling technology along with pressure to reduce emissions and waste has led to a desire to find environmentally friendly, cost competitive railway sleepers. This study conducts life cycle analyses of emissions and costs for timber, concrete, short fibre and long fibre composite railway sleepers to determine which sleepers are more environmentally friendly and cost competitive. The results clearly highlight the environmental advantages of short fibre plastic composites. The basic scenario had concrete sleepers being the most cost competitive, before factoring in the recyclability and likely future cost reductions of short fibre composite sleepers. With as little as 50% of the entirely recyclable short fibre sleepers being recycled their cost quickly becomes comparable to concrete sleepers. Further, there are several likely changes in the future that will make short fibre sleepers even more cost competitive. The short fibre industry is still growing and could substantially reduce costs through the effects of economies of scale and experience curves of production. A further driver of future cost competitiveness would be the broader use of an Australian or international carbon price, where concrete sleepers have a disadvantage. Together, these changes indicate that short fibre composites have great potential financially and environmentally.

Suggested Citation

  • Samuel Thompson & Christopher King & John Rodwell & Scott Rayburg & Melissa Neave, 2022. "Life Cycle Cost and Assessment of Alternative Railway Sleeper Materials," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-18, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:14:p:8814-:d:866157
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/14/8814/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/14/8814/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lin, Boqiang & Omoju, Oluwasola E., 2017. "Focusing on the right targets: Economic factors driving non-hydro renewable energy transition," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 52-63.
    2. Deborah Cotton & Stefan Trück, 2011. "Interaction between Australian carbon prices and energy prices," Published Paper Series 2011-5, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Qiao, Sen & Guo, Zi Xin & Tao, Zhang & Ren, Zheng Yu, 2023. "Analyzing the network structure of risk transmission among renewable, non-renewable energy and carbon markets," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 206-217.
    2. Marques, António Cardoso & Fuinhas, José Alberto & Neves, Sónia Almeida, 2018. "Ordinary and Special Regimes of electricity generation in Spain: How they interact with economic activity," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 81(P1), pages 1226-1240.
    3. Zheng, Shuhong & Yang, Juan & Yu, Shiwei, 2021. "How renewable energy technological innovation promotes renewable power generation: Evidence from China's provincial panel data," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 1394-1407.
    4. Best, Rohan & Burke, Paul J., 2018. "Adoption of solar and wind energy: The roles of carbon pricing and aggregate policy support," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 404-417.
    5. Cotton, Deborah & De Mello, Lurion, 2014. "Econometric analysis of Australian emissions markets and electricity prices," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 475-485.
    6. Antonio Colmenar-Santos & Elisabet Palomo-Torrejón & Enrique Rosales-Asensio & David Borge-Diez, 2018. "Measures to Remove Geothermal Energy Barriers in the European Union," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-29, November.
    7. Wang, Jianda & Dong, Kangyin & Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad & Dong, Xiucheng, 2023. "Does industrial convergence mitigate CO2 emissions in China? A quasi-natural experiment on “Triple Play” Reform," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    8. Nchofoung, Tii N. & Asongu, Simplice A., 2022. "Effects of infrastructures on environmental quality contingent on trade openness and governance dynamics in Africa," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 189(C), pages 152-163.
    9. kos Hamburger & G bor Harangoz, 2018. "Factors Affecting the Evolution of Renewable Electricity Generating Capacities: A Panel Data Analysis of European Countries," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 8(5), pages 161-172.
    10. Lin, Boqiang & Chen, Yufang, 2019. "Does electricity price matter for innovation in renewable energy technologies in China?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 259-266.
    11. Yu, Bolin & Fang, Debin & Xiao, Kun & Pan, Yuling, 2023. "Drivers of renewable energy penetration and its role in power sector's deep decarbonization towards carbon peak," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 178(C).
    12. Best, Rohan & Trück, Stefan, 2020. "Capital and policy impacts on Australian small-scale solar installations," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    13. Shirley Thompson, 2023. "Strategic Analysis of the Renewable Electricity Transition: Power to the World without Carbon Emissions?," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(17), pages 1-34, August.
    14. Islam, Md. Monirul & Sohag, Kazi & Hammoudeh, Shawkat & Mariev, Oleg & Samargandi, Nahla, 2022. "Minerals import demands and clean energy transitions: A disaggregated analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    15. Moises Neil V Seriño, 2022. "Energy security through diversification of non-hydro renewable energy sources in developing countries," Energy & Environment, , vol. 33(3), pages 546-561, May.
    16. Dogan, Eyup & Chishti, Muhammad Zubair & Karimi Alavijeh, Nooshin & Tzeremes, Panayiotis, 2022. "The roles of technology and Kyoto Protocol in energy transition towards COP26 targets: Evidence from the novel GMM-PVAR approach for G-7 countries," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).
    17. Jonathan Doh & Pawan Budhwar & Geoffrey Wood, 2021. "Long-term energy transitions and international business: Concepts, theory, methods, and a research agenda," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 52(5), pages 951-970, July.
    18. Chu, Lan Khanh & Ghosh, Sudeshna & Doğan, Buhari & Nguyen, Nam Hoai & Shahbaz, Muhammad, 2023. "Energy security as new determinant of renewable energy: The role of economic complexity in top energy users," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 263(PC).
    19. Fatemeh Nazifi, 2016. "The pass-through rates of carbon costs on to electricity prices within the Australian National Electricity Market," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 18(1), pages 41-62, January.
    20. Bonga-Bonga, Lumengo & Nzimande, Ntokozo & Osuma, Godswill Osagie, 2024. "The role of moderating factors in the nexus natural resource rents and renewable energy adoption," MPRA Paper 121920, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    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:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:14:p:8814-:d:866157. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.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.