Applicability of life cycle assessment methodology to conservation works in historical building: The case of cleaning

Abstract

The Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) represents a suitable methodology to evaluate quantitatively the environmental impact related to a product or a process and it can be used as a guiding tool to make effective environmental sustainability choices. While the LCA-based methods are more and more diffused in the assessment and selection of materials for new constructions, they are still scarcely applied in the field of conservation and repair of historical buildings, although these buildings, especially in Europe, represent a high percentage of the building stock. In the present paper, the LCA method was applied to the field of the restoration, with particular reference to cleaning technologies and materials, in order to investigate if LCA can be applied in this field. The analysis of results pointed out the different environmental impact of the cleaning methods investigated (ascribed to different impact categories), but also the shortcomings and proxies arising from the lack of specific database. The impact of the waste treatment stage was also analysed, in order to highlight the main impact spots related with the end of life of materials and equipment. Results showed that, for some cleaning methods, the impacts related to manufacturing and disposal are very similar, which emphasizes the importance of performing LCA including the end of life scenarios. Finally, an evaluation of externalities was performed, to provide a monetary value of the environmental damage.