Economic and environmental impacts of utilizing lower production temperatures for different bitumen samples in a batch plant

Abstract

The utilization of hot mix asphalt (HMA) for road construction necessitates high temperatures during mixing bitumen and aggregate at asphalt plant. The required (mixing) production temperature is calculated by the standard method (ASTM 2493). The application of this method for polymer modified bitumen (PMB) and warm mix asphalt (WMA) have tendency of higher temperatures. Therefore, some alternative methods suggested by literatures for the determination of production temperature for PMB and WMA have been implemented aiming to determine lower temperatures than the standard method (ASTM 2493). Moreover, the economic impacts of the determined production temperatures through different models are evaluated by the estimation of energy consumption in terms of electricity and natural gas costs for the batch type asphalt plants. Besides, the possible environmental effects are calculated by considering the carbon dioxide emissions. The results of this study have shown that the reduction in production temperatures led to a significant decrease in the total construction cost of each type of asphalt and a significant reduction in the estimated carbon dioxide emission. The results of this study can be used as a reference point for the estimation of both economic and environmental impacts of utilizing lower production temperatures for different bitumen samples.