Wikkerink, Wolters, van den Berg, Huppes
Additional Information - Posters # 1998 Gothenburg
Environmental aspects tend to be increasingly important in designing gas distribution systems and in selecting gas distribution materials. Therefore the environmental aspects of various materials options for gas distribution networks were analyzed by means of a quantitative life cycle assessment. This paper describes the methodology used and presents the quantitative endresults to indicate the potential environmental effects caused by the various materials options. In general, substantial differences are found between the individual piping systems analyzed in this study. No piping system, however, can be said to score significantly better or worse on all environmental themes relative to the other systems analyzed. Under the assumptions made, it turns out that, in general, the metal systems give higher scores than the plastics ones. Especially polyvinylchloride scores low. Gas leakages during the period of 'use' of the piping system turned out to have an important and direct effect on two of the environmental themes analyzed.
