Environmental impacts of bicycle production in Bangladesh: a cradle-to-grave life cycle assessment approach

Abstract

A bicycle is considered to be an environment-friendly and fuel-conserving mode of transport with the increasing user group and rapid innovation in production systems, but how much this assumption represents the reality needs to be ascertained. In the transportation sector, the abundance of private motorized vehicle is responsible for poor environmental condition. Bicycle can be a solution to traffic jam along with carbon dioxide (CO2) emission in a densely populated country like Bangladesh, and nowadays, it become more popular than other private transports in the country. The study aims to identify environmental impacts and hot spot of bicycle production in Bangladesh and prediction of estimate the carbon dioxide (CO2) reduction through bicycle use instead of motorized private vehicles in the country. This study was conducted under the ISO 14044 guideline. The study considered the entire life cycle of bicycle production in Bangladesh, and material preparation, manufacturing and assembly, packaging, transportation and waste generation were modeled using the life cycle assessment software SimaPro 8.5, and environmental impacts were assessed using ReCiPe version 1.3 method. Results indicate that the process of aluminum parts production is the most important factor of impacts. On the other hand, human toxicity (28.92 kg 1,4-DB eq) is the highest among all the impact categories. During the evaluation of the entire life cycle study, it was found that material preparation causes maximum environmental burden. Scenario analysis of the study reveals that 53% of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission can be reduced if only 40% of people use bicycles instead of using private transport for short distance. Comparative analysis also reveals that bicycle production in Bangladesh is better than Europe in terms of climate change, human toxicity, particulate matter formation, metal depletion and fossil depletion impact categories. Bicycle use can reduce automobile dependency and be a step toward a sustainable transportation system in Bangladesh. Development in the identified hot spot of the study and adoption of green technology can ensure a much cleaner production of bicycle.