Evaluation of LCA Tools for Road Construction and Operation Purposes: A Case Study in Nordic Europe

Numerous life cycle assessment (LCA) tools for roads are available in Finland and the Nordic countries. These are distinct in aspects such as the LCA stages and standards they are based on, ultimately limiting their capabilities to comprehensively perform an LCA encompassing the use stage. Despite the prevailing differences, adequate studies have yet to be performed to assess and compare these tools. This research evaluated the possibility of combining two LCA tools, ZEROInfra and FuelSave, developed for road construction and operating purposes, respectively, and used by Ramboll Finland Oy, a major consultant in Finland. Additional LCA tools, such as VegLCA from Norway and Klimatkalkyl from Sweden, are incorporated to compare the emission estimations for the product and construction stages of LCA. With the same system boundary, the results showed that emissions estimated by ZEROInfra, Klimatkalkyl, and VegLCA were equivalent, reporting results between 2.4 to 2.5 kt of CO₂ eq. However, the environmental impact of each component work item varied due to the differences in aspects such as material property and equipment assumptions by each tool and the aggregation of work items to fit into the input features of the tools. The operation stage of LCA from vehicles was estimated by FuelSave, which resulted in 124 kt of CO₂ for 20 years, showing that the dominant contribution to the environmental impact originates from this stage of LCA.