Government emphasis on whole life value welcomed by concrete infrastructure sector

Construction minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP has announced that future government construction tenders will place a greater emphasis on whole life value as a way forward to reduce carbon emissions towards achieving net zero. Her announcement at the recent Construction News’s Decarbonising Construction event was welcomed by Britpave, the cement and concrete infrastructure body.

Outlining the actions that the government are taking to push the construction industry towards net-zero, Travelyan said: “It’s likely that, going forward, government tenders will place greater emphasis on climate change. We have made it very clear that whole-life value rather than upfront cost is key, and carbon impact is a critical element in assessing broader value.”

The recognition of the whole life value as a key element of reducing carbon emissions is an important one for the concrete sector which has long argued that concrete infrastructure solutions offer a better long-term option. Joe Quirke, Britpave chairman explained: “Concrete pavements can last beyond 40 years without having to be replaced and without minimum maintenance compared with the frequent maintenance and re-construction necessary for other road solutions. This means that concrete roads have a reduced CO2 impact over their longer performance life.”

Concrete roads can also reduce transport CO2 emissions. Concrete roads are stiffer than asphalt and so have less ‘play’ when vehicles tyre roll over them. This means less rolling resistance resulting in more efficient fuel consumption. These fuel savings can be particularly significant for heavy good vehicles The increased fuel efficiency resulting from driving on concrete roads has been proven by several research studies. Research carried out the Canadian National Research Council’s Centre for Surface Transportation Technology, the Swedish Road and Transport Research Institute and the Nippon Expressway Research Institute have all found that found that heavy goods vehicles use up to 6% less fuel and cars up to 2% less fuel when travelling on a concrete road compared to an asphalt pavement.

Whilst the percentages for individual vehicles may be small when they are combined by the number of vehicles travelling over the same section of road then the CO2 savings are significant. A Eupave report ‘Concrete Pavements Contribute to Decarbonising of Transport’ collated data based on the Canadian research and found that for a 100km road carrying 15,000 heavy good vehicles per day the CO2 savings equated to 36,450 tonnes a day. Over 30 years that translates to reducing CO2 emissions by 399,127,500 tonnes. “Such a significant saving over a concrete road’s life drawfs its initial construction CO2 impact”, said Quirke.

The government’s decarbonising transport plans focus strongly on the widespread adoption of electric vehicles (EVs). However, the lack of a battery-charging infrastructure could severely hamper their uptake. Quirke advocates that the potential of concrete ‘eRoads’ that inductively charge EVs as they travel is examined. Inductive charging is where the EV battery is charged without the need to plug the vehicle into a charging point. The process is wireless and can be done whilst the EV is on the move or stationary. If the vehicle is moving the process is referred to ‘dynamic charging’.

There are a number of concrete eRoad options that are being researched and developed where electric coils are installed within the road surface to create a magnetic field. The magnetic field creates an electric current in a secondary coil placed on the vehicle’s undercarriage which feeds the charge to the vehicle’s batteries.

“What is being underlined by the research is the need for the road surface to have long-term durability and minimum maintenance. Both are inherent characteristics of concrete roads,” said Quirke. He added: “A further benefit of concrete roads for the installation wireless modules is that in hot summer temperatures they, unlike asphalt, do not melt. Such melting could dislodge and compromise the positioned embedded wireless system.”

Durability and minimum maintenance are key for future roads providing best whole life educed CO2. It is ironic that concrete roads, often seen as being an environmental problem, could, in fact, be the environmental solution to providing a transport infrastructure that can significantly forward the decarbonising transport agenda.”