Abstract:
Carbon dioxide emissions mitigation from road construction activities is one of potential
pathways to deal with climate change. Aiming to estimate the magnitude of carbon dioxide
emissions from construction phase of real entire road project. This thesis focuses on
calculation of carbon emissions from a road project made from recycle plastic at Ataturk
Avenue, Islamabad. The plastic waste quantity in municipal solid waste is increasing due
to increase in population and changes in lifestyle. Plastic roads are found to perform better
than ordinary roads and therefore use of plastic road construction has gained importance
these days. Utilization of waste plastic bituminous mixes has proved that these enhance the
properties of mix in addition to solving disposal problems. The emissions from road
materials extraction and production, to-site transportation, on-site construction machinery
and other phases during road life cycle including road construction, maintenance, recycling
of road even make up 5% to 25% of total CO2 emissions from transport and among stages,
construction phase was the biggest contributor to road project emissions.(Y. Liu, Wang, &
Li, 2017) This research aims at identifying critical factors in calculating carbon emissions
from a road construction project. This research uses Life Cycle Assessment as its
methodology to calculate the emissions from material, equipment and transport which
makes up for the total carbon emission. This study undertakes a comparison between a
conventional and plastic mix asphalt road based on carbon emission amount. Inventory
analysis is done which shows that the materials used are the major source of carbon
emissions. This study helps identify major factors important for calculating carbon
emission which are emissions from material, emissions from transport and emissions from
equipment. Also, this study shows that plastic road emits 5 ton lesser CO2 emissions than
from a conventional road. It suggests this as well that difference between the emissions is
from the difference between the quantity of materials due to the addition of waste plastic
in plastic mix asphalt.
