Life Cycle Assessment and Life Cycle Cost Assessment of Prestressed Concrete Railway Sleepers: A 100-Year Perspective

Railway infrastructure components have long service lives and require periodic maintenance and replacement, making their environmental and economic performance relevant from a life-cycle perspective. This study investigates Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Cost Assessment (LCCA) to evaluate 1 km of RFI 260-VN prestressed concrete railway sleepers over a 100-year period. The LCA follows ISO 14044 and EN 15804, while the LCCA follows ISO 15686-5 and considers discount rates of 1%, 3%, and 6%, together with a Project Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT)-based reference value. In the baseline scenario, the total climate change impact (GWP-t) is 588,835 kg CO2 eq./km, with the production stage accounting for 85.1% of the total. Non-renewable primary energy use (PENRE) is 5,830,475 MJ/km, compared with 229,859 MJ/km of renewable primary energy (PERE). The total life-cycle cost ranges from 2.35 million €/km ranges from €2.35 million/km at a 1% discount rate to 0.92 million €/km at 6%, with a PERT-based value of 1.40 million €/km. A sensitivity scenario was then developed by increasing the renewable share of the Italian residual electricity mix from 9.49% to 60%, while keeping electricity consumption unchanged. The modified mix reduces GWP-t to 588,555 kg CO2 eq./km (i.e., −0.05%) and in PENRE to 5,807,386 MJ/km (i.e., −0.40%), while increases PERE to 243,617 MJ/km (i.e., +5.99%). The additional cost associated with Guarantees of Origin remains below 1% of the total life-cycle cost. Overall, the results show that the environmental performance of the investigated sleeper system is primarily driven by material production, whereas modifying the foreground electricity mix produces marginal effects in total life-cycle impacts.