Environmental comparison of a railway bridge with alternative designs

Railway bridges are complex structures that remain for a long life span and consume large amount of material and energy throughout the life span. All of those lead to considerable resource depletion and environmental burdens. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has proved to be a comprehensive tool for quantifying and assessing the environmental impacts of the products through its whole life cycle. This paper presents a comparative case study between two alternative designs of Banafjäl Bridge: ballast track design and fixed slab track design. The methodology of LCA is utilized as a supporting tool. The assessment considers the key environmental category of global warming potential from 'cradle to gate', which covers the material production and distribution process. The result shows that the fixed-slab design indicates a better environmental performance than the ballast track design.