Sustainability Metrics for High Performance Infrastructure Materials

To achieve more sustainable use of polymers and concrete in the US infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, and energy production, specifiers attempt to maximize some measure of sustainability and industry tries to develop innovative materials/solutions to address the most critical sustainability metrics.  To support these advances, common sustainability metrics will be identified from traceable documents, and these metrics will be prioritized using broad industry engagement and feedback.  The measurement science and services needs for addressing the critical metrics will be identified, and a long-term plan will be developed for a technology resource to benefit materials manufacturers, specifiers, builders, and facility owners so they may be continuously informed of the latest technical advances, standard test methods, and industry practice for improving the sustainability of the materials and the manufacturing processes used in the US infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, and energy production.

Objective: By the end of FY2012, identify and prioritize common sustainability performance metrics, develop a plan for providing the measurement science and services needs in support of the critical sustainability performance metrics for concrete and polymeric materials used in the Nation's infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, and energy production, and develop another plan for establishing an industry resource for delivering these services.

What is the new technical idea?  A prioritized list of critical sustainability metrics will be identified and used to guide the measurement science research and services that support innovations in the formulation and manufacturing of concrete and polymeric materials for use in the Nation's infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, and energy production. Although the details of specific sustainability measures may differ, there are common metrics that apply, including natural resource consumption, embodied energy, energy use, greenhouse gas emission, and type and quantity of waste produced.  Service life is not explicitly defined as a metric in most economic sustainability tools, but is considered as part of the economic analysis.  Since the sustainability index calculation is conducted over a fixed period, the number of times the material/component has to be replaced over that period of time represents a multiplicative factor for all of the embodied energy, waste management, and environmental impact numbers.  Therefore, increased material or product service life can be an important sustainability metric that can have a significant impact on overall sustainability.  Because each one of these metrics deserves consideration, and because there are many possible metrics to consider, a prioritized list of metrics is needed to ensure that work is concentrated on those innovations that will have the greatest impact.

The difficulty in identifying important sustainability metrics and prioritizing them is utilizing the proper perspective.  At sufficiently fine detail, such as specific applications, the different metrics may have different priorities among the sustainability measures/tools being used.  Therefore, the sustainability metrics need to be assessed from an industrial sector perspective, in addition to a product or material perspective.  Once the common metrics have been identified, broad industry feedback will be used to prioritize the critical common metrics.

Once the critical metrics have been identified and prioritized, the associated technical barriers and measurement science and services needed to overcome the barriers and fully address the critical metrics will be investigated.   Furthermore, a long-term plan will be proposed for providing the industry with a resource for identifying innovative solutions, methods of characterizing sustainable performance, and acceptance criteria for maximizing the sustainability of their products and processes.

What is the research plan?  The activities in the research plan will rely upon identifying important traceable documents and will involve broad industry engagement and feedback.   The research will be conducted in phases as follows:

• Identify and prioritize common sustainability metrics from traceable documents and end-users
• Identify technology barriers to maximizing material or system performance within each critical metric
• Develop a plan for addressing gaps in the measurement science research and services needs for these technologies

The traceable documents utilized will contain sustainability metrics from the broad perspective of the national economy. These will be based on official U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis Input-Output tables that show how industries interact to provide input to, and take output from, each other.  "Environmental extensions" of these tables can be used to identify the life-cycle environmental impacts of most concern for broad categories of polymeric and concrete materials used in the U.S. construction industry.  Based on this initial prioritization of impacts, a list of critical technologies will be developed for improving sustainability performance in each. Industrial contacts and professionals working with, or developing, sustainability indicators will  serve as potential partners who will be asked to participate in a targeted workshop to validate a finalized priority list of sustainability metrics.

Based on the validated priority list, the technologies and any technology barriers will be identified, and, a plan will be developed for meeting the measurement science needed to address these technologies and technical barriers.   This plan will utilize end-user engagement, and will be incorporated into and used to guide the FY2013 Sustainable High Performance Infrastructure Materials Program. 

In addition, a strategy will be developed to establish the NIST Engineering Laboratory as a resource portal for communicating recent research, standards, practice, and product advances relevant to sustainability, to the industry and public institutions.  This portal will become an important resource for delivering sustainability program tools and resources to end-users, and will facilitate collaboration and cross-fertilization of ideas and research strategies between NIST and participating organizations.  This activity will also serve to engage end-users on a regular basis to obtain feedback and support future program planning.

Partnering and end-user engagement will be critical to achieving the project goals.  Partners and end-users will be identified from federal agencies, standards development organizations, trade organizations and industry.  The partners from federal agencies are important because we will consider the perspective of public physical infrastructure, of which a large part is federally owned, operated, and/or maintained.  The partnership with SDOs will be primarily through interactions on standards committees.  The end users will include federal agencies, trade organizations, and a broad spectrum of the industry that includes design professionals, producers, manufacturers, specifiers, and facility owners.  Both partners and end-users will be engaged throughout the project by having  preliminary input on the draft plan, and participating in a workshop.  After the first year, there will be a number of mechanisms developed for information and technology delivery that will involve direct involvement with end-users.

Standards and Codes:

The following standards committees focus on sustainability in the US infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, and energy production and will be explored to identify potential partners in advancing and disseminating the results of the program.

ACI Committee 130 Sustainability of Concrete: There are two related subcommittees: 130-0D Rating Systems/Sustainability Tools; 130-0E Design/Specifications/Codes/Regulations.  Because the activity in the committee covers all of the concrete industry, taking an active role on either of these subcommittees could provide a venue for identifying those activities that best meet industry needs, for informing the industry of the work we are doing, and for identifying partners and end-users. 

ASTM E60Sustainability: subcommittee E60.01 Buildings and Construction has jurisdiction over E1991 Standard Guide for Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of Building Materials/Products, E2114 Standard Terminology for Sustainability Relative to the Performance of Buildings, E2129 Standard Practice for Data Collection for Sustainability Assessment of Building Products, and E2432 Standard Guide for General Principles of Sustainability Relative to Buildings.

AASHTO Standing Committee on Environment (SCOE) encourages, recommends and supports programs and initiatives to streamline the environmental review process and promote environmental stewardship, and it also promotes practices that protect and enhance the quality of the environment and promotes and encourages interagency cooperation and coordination in the resolution of environmental issues.

ISO Technical Committee 59, Subcommittee C 17 Sustainability in Buildings and Civil Engineering Works covers the standardization of terminology and organization of information in building and civil engineering processes related to functional/user requirements and performances.