Sustainability in bridge construction processes

Abstract

Sustainability must be seen as a global issue. In order to achieve that goal, it is necessary to apply its principles to all industrial activities, including those that are not traditionally engaged with such guidelines, which is the case of Bridge Construction. This paper evaluates the consumption of steel and energy and the emissions of carbon dioxide due to the use of movable scaffolding systems (MSS) in the Bridge Construction industry. The values obtained considering the use of conventional MSS are compared with the ones obtained using a new sustainable technology which is herein synthetically described-the organic prestressing system (OPS). In order to compare the sustainability of the two systems, a prediction of the material and energy consumptions, and CO2 emissions for traditional MSS and for MSS equipped with OPS is performed until 2025. © The Author(s) 2009.