Life Cycle Assessment of Heavy-Duty Truck for Highway Transport in China

Abstract

The detailed life cycle assessment of heavy-duty truck for highway transport in China is conducted by Centre of National Material Life Cycle Assessment (CNMLCA). The input of energy and output of pollutants emissions are documented as the life cycle inventory (LCI). The life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) results calculated with the CML method show that the hotspot of environmental impacts from transport in China. The environmental benefits from implementations of European emissions standards in China for transport are also analyzed. The analysis shows that the acidification potential (AP) makes the most huge contribution to total environmental impact, up to 33.7%. As the second hotsopt, global warming potential (GWP) takes up 26.83% of total environmental impact. Photochemical oxidant formation potential (POCP) takes up 23.42% of total environmental impact, which is more or less the same comparing with the result of GWP. Eutrophication potential (EP) takes up 15.05% of total environmental impact. The last but not the least environmental impact category - human toxicity potential (HTP), only takes up 0.95% of total environmental impact. If the heavy metal and dioxin emissions are also considered, maybe the results will be changed and the HTP will take more in the whole environmental impact. It can be concluded that if we pay more attention on SO2emissions especially NOx emissions reduction, the acidification and photochemical smog would be relieved a lot and the total environmental impact can be decreased a lot. More punishment on overload may be a good choice to reduce environmental load of heavy truck of highway transport in China.