Abstract

Integrating sustainability in the road construction sector is omnipresent and is still gaining interest. This paper"br" specifically addresses the topic of environment-friendly and sustainable procurement of road works (Green"br" Public Procurement). The Belgian Road Research Centre has formed a national working group with members"br" from road administrations, road contractors, and sustainability experts."br" The main objectives of this working group are to help road authorities (at the national and regional levels) in the"br" process of including sustainability indicators in their road tenders, with a view to achieving Green Public"br" Procurement in their road projects, and to keep abreast of new developments: European guidelines, best practices"br" in the sector, progress in other sectors such as the building industry, and certification in other sectors and in road"br" construction."br" The aim is to define the most important sustainability (environmental-social-financial) indicators in the life cycle"br" of a road pavement, and use the evaluation of these to come to an overall assessment of the road’s sustainability"br" for use as a criterion in tendering. Pragmatic choices are made from the basket of sustainability indicators to"br" keep the methodology easy and simple yet objective, without aspiring to a full life cycle analysis."br" A pilot project has been set up with global warming potential, the depletion of materials, noise, responsible"br" sourcing, road availability and annoyance to people, and direct construction costs as environmental, social and"br" financial indicators. Each of these is split up into sub-indicators (such as road transport, recycled contents, tyreroad"br" noise, or rolling resistance) that are all assessed by an easy procedure for both the contractor and the road"br" administration, respectively, thereby delivering and checking the sustainability information in the tender."br" The evaluation leads to a single value, i.e., a weighted sustainability score. This score affects the actual tender"br" price in such way that direct costs as well as the sustainability score both determine which contractor wins the"br" bid."br" The paper describes the implementation of the methodology in the pilot project.

Abstract

The adoption of new sustainable technologies by National Road Administrations (NRAs) throughout Europe is often a slow and difficult process. The set of potentially relevant sustainability indicators which need to be considered from a life cycle perspective is wide and NRAs are often confronted with a large amount of missing or uncertain data. The EDGAR project (Evaluation and Decision process for Greener Asphalt Roads), funded by the CEDR (Conference of European Directors of Roads) Transnational Road Research Program Call 2013 ‘Energy Efficiency’, developed a methodology to facilitate quicker adoption of the technologies that offer the greatest sustainability benefits for the road sector and the society as a whole. EDGAR proposed a reduced basket of sustainability indicators specifically designed for asphalt materials and directly relevant to NRAs. A methodology was then devised to quantify these indicators, using either existing or new tools, and to implement the results in a Multiple Attribute Decision Making Model to make a balanced and well informed decision.