1

INFRASTRUCTURE:
EARTHWORKS,
TRANSPORTATION
Lecture 9
 Today’s lecture
2

 Earthworks: pavement materials, geotechnical

engineering
 Transportation infrastructure
 Electricity provision
 Reviews:
 Naomi: Energy in buildings and green rating systems
 Federico: low carbon transport fuels in Europe
 Evaluation of site preparation
3

 Construction site development, earthworks

 Construction waste and recycling

 Case study examples:

 Building materials: using recycled concrete
aggregates in new concrete
 Site selection affect LUC
4

Raymond et al. doi:10.1111/jiec.12946.

 Site Selection: land use change
5

 Aim to prevent ecological damage (ideally leave the site in

better ecological condition):
 Tree protection through fencing
 Salvage vegetation, protect biodiversity: transplant
elsewhere
 Restore any damage through purchased offsets to
compensate
 e.g., green condominium project in Costa Rica invested in
reforestation (2 ha, 250 trees) to compensate for its development
 Other green building strategies: LED lighting, water saving
taps/toilets, greywater recycling and treatment, certified timber,
low-emitting paints, solar energy supply (electricity grid)
6
 Stormwater, erosion & sediment control
7

 Soil stabilization
 Temporary seeding: plant fast growing grasses to
stabilize soils
 Permanent seeding: plant trees, shrubs, grasses at end
of project
 Mulching: stabilize soil with straw, wood chips or gravel

 Structural controls of soils

 Strategies to limit sediment runoff from stormwater
 Earth dike, wattle, silt fence, sediment trap, sediment
basins
 Earthworks: geotechnical engineering
8

 Ground improvement methods

 Deep dynamic compaction
 Vibro stone columns

 Compation grouting

 Vertical drains

 Impacts are very site-dependent

 Uncertainty in impact of ground improvement
method significant
 Cost design guidelines: www.geotechtools.org
 Use of recycled/green construction
materials
9

 Construction site development, earthworks

 Construction waste and recycling

 Green concrete

 Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of RCA

 Case study examples:

 Building materials: using recycled concrete
aggregates in new concrete
 Green Concrete
10

 Green curing compounds & admixtures

 Bio-based agents; reduce water needs for hydration
 Hydration control admixtures
 Extend placement time; reduce waste
 Insulated concrete forms
 Stay-in-place concrete forms
 Permanent, part of building envelope

 Compact storage; quick assembly

 Expandable PS material
11
 Green Concrete
12

 Supplementary cementitious materials

 Recycled industrial residues (fly ash, blast furnace slag)
 Lowers GHG intensity of cement
 Alternative aggregates
 Recycled concrete aggregate (RCA), tyre rubber,
class/cullet
 Recycled content reinforcing
 Recycled reinforcing steel (high content)
 Return concrete recycling
 Recovery/re-use of concrete in masonry units or precast
concrete
 Green Concrete
13

 Concrete reclaiming
 Apply washing process to unhardened concrete to
separate aggregate and a cement/water slurry that
can be processed back into raw materials
Construction Aggregates

 Comprise 70% (mass) of all materials

consumed annually (U.S.)
¼ for new cement concrete
 ¾ in road construction

 Comprises 20% of all material input to the

economy
 Annual waste ~180 million tons concrete
debris
 95 million tons of recycled concrete aggregate
(RCA) produced annually
14
RCA can be recovered from Construction & Demolition
(C&D) Waste
 Solid waste

 From construction or demolition of

buildings/structures
 wood
 plaster
 metals
 asphaltic substances
 Bricks, block and unsegregated
concrete
(US EPA)

 85% RCA cascades down in value

(road base)
 6% used in new concrete

15
Why Reuse or Recycle C&D Waste?
 Quality materials can
be reused or recycled

 Reduce consumption

 Extend the useful life of

building
components/valuable
materials

 Cost effective
16
 C&D Research
17

 Challenges
 Incomplete and unobservable data
 Discrete industry
 Difficult to track exact flows
 Difficult to assume costs

 Tools:
 MSA/MFA: Industrial Ecology
 GIS
 Techno-economic analysis
 Life cycle assessment
18
 Case study: Should we use RCA in
19
new concrete?

 What is concrete?
 Why use recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) in
new concrete?
 There may be benefits to recycling materials
 Using waste in new products reduces waste to
landfill and potentially creates value from waste
 What are the energy and GHG tradeoffs of
recycling RCA into new concrete?
 Composite material
20

Portland cement
Coarse aggregates
Fine aggregates
Chemical admixtures
Water
Air
+

Concrete
 Substitute for coarse aggregates
21
Sorting, processing

RCA -
Mixed
construction finished
product
debris
 Fixed recycler: imports debris
22

Concrete debris

Primary crusher

Waste separation

Excavators Secondary crusher

Wheel loaders Screen(-) (+)

Weighing

Non-spread Stacker

RCA
Spread
 Mobile recycler: imports equipment
23

Concrete debris

Crusher

Waste separation

(-) (+)
Screen

Stacker

RCA
Spread
 Motivation – two questions:
24

 Can RCA be used in new concrete mixes?

 Yes, in many cases
 Fine RCA: a subject of investigation
 Road sub-base: https://doi.org/10.4401/ag-7785
 Coarse RCA degrade strength up to 15% after 30%
substitution threshold
• Requires more cement or less water
 Decrease workability
• Requires more water or superplasticizing admixture
 Affects some properties, but can be acceptable
• Concrete is already a variable material
 80 Compressive strength (f c ' , MPa)
25
w /b = 0.26
70
Source: Limbachiya (2000); RCA
60 from rejected precast concrete
50 RCA substitution
thresholds
40

30
w /b = 0.65
20
Source: Limbachiya (2004); RCA
10 from mixed concrete debris
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
% RCA substitution
 Motivation – two questions:
26

 Can RCA be used in new concrete mixes?

 Yes, in many cases

 What are the benefits and consequences?

 Use LCI to evaluate
 Life cycle inventory
27

 Compares production of:

 “Normal” concrete (0% substitution)
 Concretes with 20%, 30%, 50% and 100% RCA
substitution
 FU: 1m3 concrete with a cylinder compressive
strength (f’c), 24MPa
 Specific to North America
 Publicly-available emissions data
 Lack of data for RCA production
 (existing infrastructure)

Infrastructure
28 demolition
Raw
Limestone
materials

Crushed Portland
RCA Gravel
stone cement

Energy

Mixing,
Landfilling
casting

(new concrete)

Legend: Included Excluded Materials transport

 Sample Data
29
 Sample Data
30
 More substitution, more cement
31

Coarse RCA substitution

0% 20% 30% 50% 100%

Mix properties
Water/binder ratio 0.65 0.65 0.64 0.62 0.59

Component quantities (kg/m3 concrete)

RCA 0 252 378 630 1260
Gravel 0 -98 -147 -246 -491
Crushed stone 0 -154 -231 -384 -769
Portland cement 0 0 3.9 12.1 25.5
 10 GHG emissions (kg CO2-eq./t RCA)
32

8
Mobile plant, with spread
transportation distance
6

Fixed plant
4

2 100 km Limit
50 km
25 km
0
0 100 200 300 400 500
Job Size (t RCA)
 80 Relative Energy Intensity (MJ/f.u.)
33

70 Transportation distances

60 RCA 25 km
Crushed stone 50 km
50
Gravel 50 km
40 Increase due
to cement Recycled
30
material cost
20

10 Reduction due to
reduction increase transportation
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
% RCA substitution
 Findings
34

 Mobile recycling preferable setup for all but

smallest production scales
 Two factors dominate LC models:
 Portlandcement
 Aggregate transport distance

 Best to consider RCA substitution on case-by-

case basis

Ref: McIntyre, Spatari, MacLean, J. Infrastructure Systems (2009)

 GI Materials: fill material, recycled content
• Green infrastructure (GI) for decentralized stormwater management
– Demands different set of construction materials -> geotextiles, geo-pipe

GI Materials m3
Asphalt Recycled material 307
Select granular fill, coarse gravel 460
Select granular fill, coarse gravel 35.1
Select granular fill, AASHTO 57 19.4
Select granular fill, coarse gravel 323
Filter fabric (all sides of gravel layer) 227
Wire mesh 691
Drive (wood) sheeting 499
Root mitigation 406
Poly tree gratings (4' ´ 4') 12
6" Perforated pipe Recycled HDPE 91.4

35
Spatari, Yu, Montalto. et al. Environmental Pollution 2011, 159, (8-9), 2174-2179.
 Further Reading
36

 Blanck, G., Cuisinier, O. & Masrouri, F. Life cycle assessment of non-traditional

treatments for the valorisation of dry soils in earthworks. doi:10.1007/s11367-016-
1076-y (2016).
 Raymond, A. J., Tipton, J. R., Kendall, A. & DeJong, J. T. Review of impact categories
and environmental indicators for life cycle assessment of geotechnical systems.
doi:10.1111/jiec.12946.
 Karlsson, C. S. J. et al. Life cycle assessment in road infrastructure planning using
spatial geological data. doi:10.1007/s11367-016-1241-3 (2017).
 Capony, A. et al. Monitoring and environmental modeling of earthwork impacts: A
road construction case study. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2013.03.007
(2013).
37
  Emphasis on circular
economy
 Use of recycled
materials

38
39
40

10-minute Break