IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v11y2019i8p2367-d224592.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Estimation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Produced by Road Projects in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Author

Listed:
  • Mohammed H. Alzard

    (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551 Al Ain, UAE)

  • Munjed A. Maraqa

    (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551 Al Ain, UAE)

  • Rezaul Chowdhury

    (School of Civil Engineering and Surveying, University of Southern Queensland, 4350 Toowoomba, Australia)

  • Qasim Khan

    (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551 Al Ain, UAE)

  • Francisco D. B. Albuquerque

    (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551 Al Ain, UAE)

  • Timur Ibrahim Mauga

    (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551 Al Ain, UAE)

  • Khaled Nazmi Aljunadi

    (Infrastructure Support Department, Abu Dhabi City Municipality, 2460 Abu Dhabi, UAE)

Abstract

Assessing the current levels of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from road transportation projects allows for benchmarking and is essential for potential emissions reduction. The objective of this study was to estimate the GHG emissions associated with the construction and operation of three road cases—two primary roads and one secondary road network—in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. The GHG emissions produced by the study cases were estimated using the RoadCO 2 estimation tool. Results showed that the total emissions (in kg CO 2 e/m 2 /y) range from 76 for the secondary road case to 1100 for the primary road cases. The operation phase is responsible for 94–98% of these emissions; the construction phase is responsible for the rest. Road works contributed the most to GHG emissions during the construction phase. The contribution of the remaining categories of the construction phase fluctuates within a certain case and among the considered cases. The equipment used in the construction phase for the three cases contributed 15–70% of the total phase emissions, while the remaining emissions were due to construction materials. In the operation phase, emissions were mainly generated by vehicle movement. Street lighting also contributed to emissions during the operation phase. On the other hand, the irrigation of planted trees along the road had a very low impact on GHG emissions, and carbon sequestration by these trees had a negligible effect in terms of acting as a carbon sink. The results obtained from this study were compared with other cases reported in the literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Mohammed H. Alzard & Munjed A. Maraqa & Rezaul Chowdhury & Qasim Khan & Francisco D. B. Albuquerque & Timur Ibrahim Mauga & Khaled Nazmi Aljunadi, 2019. "Estimation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Produced by Road Projects in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(8), pages 1-16, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:8:p:2367-:d:224592
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2367/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2367/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Matthias Finkbeiner & Erwin M. Schau & Annekatrin Lehmann & Marzia Traverso, 2010. "Towards Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 2(10), pages 1-14, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hossam A. Gabbar, 2021. "Modeling of Interconnected Infrastructures with Unified Interface Design toward Smart Cities," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-17, July.
    2. Virág, Doris & Wiedenhofer, Dominik & Baumgart, André & Matej, Sarah & Krausmann, Fridolin & Min, Jihoon & Rao, Narasimha D. & Haberl, Helmut, 2022. "How much infrastructure is required to support decent mobility for all? An exploratory assessment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    3. Haneen Abuzaid & Raghad Almashhour & Ghassan Abu-Lebdeh, 2024. "Driving towards Sustainability: A Neural Network-Based Prediction of the Traffic-Related Effects on Road Users in the UAE," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(3), pages 1-22, January.
    4. Mohamed Kadria & Sahbi Farhani & Yosr Guirat, 2021. "Investigating the Relationships between Renewable Energy Consumption, Socio-Economic Factors and Health: A PVAR Analysis from MENA Net Oil Importing Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    5. Khan, Qasim Raza & Xinshu, Mao & Qamri, Ghulam Muhammad & Nawaz, Ahmad, 2023. "From COVID to conflict: Understanding the deriving forces of environment and implications for natural resources," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    6. Munjed A. Maraqa & Francisco D. B. Albuquerque & Mohammed H. Alzard & Rezaul Chowdhury & Lina A. Kamareddine & Jamal El Zarif, 2021. "GHG Emission Reduction Opportunities for Road Projects in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi: A Scenario Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1-22, July.

    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. Kristina Henzler & Stephanie D. Maier & Michael Jäger & Rafael Horn, 2020. "SDG-Based Sustainability Assessment Methodology for Innovations in the Field of Urban Surfaces," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(11), pages 1-32, June.
    2. Hannah Karlewski & Annekatrin Lehmann & Klaus Ruhland & Matthias Finkbeiner, 2019. "A Practical Approach for Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Automotive Industry," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-60, August.
    3. Oana Țugulea, 2017. "City Brand Personality—Relations with Dimensions and Dimensions Inter-Relations," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-22, December.
    4. Cristina López & Rocío Ruíz-Benítez & Carmen Vargas-Machuca, 2019. "On the Environmental and Social Sustainability of Technological Innovations in Urban Bus Transport: The EU Case," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(5), pages 1-22, March.
    5. Mauro Sciarelli & Mario Tani & Giovanni Landi & Ornella Papaluca, 2019. "The Impact of Social Responsibility Disclosure on Corporate Financial Health: Evidences from Some Italian Public Companies," International Business Research, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 12(3), pages 109-122, March.
    6. Julian Gaus & Sven Wehking & Andreas H. Glas & Michael Eßig, 2022. "Economic Sustainability by Using Life Cycle Cost Information in the Buying Center: Insights from the Public Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-28, February.
    7. Diana Carolina Gámez-García & José Manuel Gómez-Soberón & Ramón Corral-Higuera & Héctor Saldaña-Márquez & María Consolación Gómez-Soberón & Susana Paola Arredondo-Rea, 2018. "A Cradle to Handover Life Cycle Assessment of External Walls: Choice of Materials and Prognosis of Elements," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-24, August.
    8. Man Yu & Anthony Halog, 2015. "Solar Photovoltaic Development in Australia—A Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(2), pages 1-35, January.
    9. Serenella Sala & Rana Pant & Michael Hauschild & David Pennington, 2012. "Research Needs and Challenges from Science to Decision Support. Lesson Learnt from the Development of the International Reference Life Cycle Data System (ILCD) Recommendations for Life Cycle Impact As," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 4(7), pages 1-14, June.
    10. Henke, S. & Theuvsen, L., 2014. "Social Life Cycle Assessment: Eine sozioökonomische Analyse der Biogasproduktion," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 49, March.
    11. Thies, Christian & Kieckhäfer, Karsten & Spengler, Thomas S. & Sodhi, Manbir S., 2019. "Operations research for sustainability assessment of products: A review," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 274(1), pages 1-21.
    12. Stella Stoycheva & Alex Zabeo & Lisa Pizzol & Danail Hristozov, 2022. "Socio-Economic Life Cycle-Based Framework for Safe and Sustainable Design of Engineered Nanomaterials and Nano-Enabled Products," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(9), pages 1-23, May.
    13. Rafael Horn & Hanaa Dahy & Johannes Gantner & Olga Speck & Philip Leistner, 2018. "Bio-Inspired Sustainability Assessment for Building Product Development—Concept and Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-25, January.
    14. Giuseppe Ioppolo & Stefano Cucurachi & Roberta Salomone & Giuseppe Saija & Lei Shi, 2016. "Sustainable Local Development and Environmental Governance: A Strategic Planning Experience," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(2), pages 1-16, February.
    15. Aurelio Tommasetti & Riccardo Mussari & Gennaro Maione & Daniela Sorrentino, 2020. "Sustainability Accounting and Reporting in the Public Sector: Towards Public Value Co-Creation?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-19, March.
    16. Jaume Freire-Gonz lez & Ignasi Puig-Ventosa, 2015. "Energy Efficiency Policies and the Jevons Paradox," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 5(1), pages 69-79.
    17. Tobias Engelmann & Daniel Fischer & Marianne Lörchner & Jaya Bowry & Holger Rohn, 2019. "“Doing” Sustainability Assessment in Different Consumption and Production Contexts—Lessons from Case Study Comparison," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(24), pages 1-25, December.
    18. Anna Maria Ferrari & Lucrezia Volpi & Martina Pini & Cristina Siligardi & Fernando Enrique García-Muiña & Davide Settembre-Blundo, 2019. "Building a Sustainability Benchmarking Framework of Ceramic Tiles Based on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA)," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-30, January.
    19. Sabrina Neugebauer & Silvia Forin & Matthias Finkbeiner, 2016. "From Life Cycle Costing to Economic Life Cycle Assessment—Introducing an Economic Impact Pathway," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(5), pages 1-23, April.
    20. Maria Ljunggren Söderman & Ola Eriksson & Anna Björklund & Göran Östblom & Tomas Ekvall & Göran Finnveden & Yevgeniya Arushanyan & Jan-Olov Sundqvist, 2016. "Integrated Economic and Environmental Assessment of Waste Policy Instruments," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(5), pages 1-21, April.

    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:11:y:2019:i:8:p:2367-:d:224592. 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.