A Study on the Introduction of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for Rolling Stocks

철도차량에 대한 전과정평가 도입을 위한 방안 연구

Due to sustainable development, international environmental regulations have been reinforced continuously. Especially, Kyoto protocol related to energy consumption affects to national production system seriously. Even if railroad is the most environmental- friendly transportation, it is necessary to improve its environment. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a representative tool to evaluate the environment impacts of a product. In the EU's railroad companies, the recycling efficiency and the waste emissions of rolling stocks have improved considering their environment impacts with LCA from a design step. Also, the LCA system of Korean electric motor units has been developed to build an environmentally sound railroad as one of national transportation core technology R&D projects. Therefore, the introduction of LCA will be required to decrease environmental impacts released from rolling stocks in the future.