Life cycle risk assessment of bottom ash reuse

The life cycle thinking was integrated with risk assessment to develop the life cycle risk assessment (LCRA) methodology in this study. Because LCRA assessed risks from a life cycle perspective of the concerned policies, it was helpful to identify important sources, contaminants, receptors and exposure pathways along the life cycle of reuse activities. The case study showed that different reuse scenarios resulted in risk shift between different life stages and receptors, and using duration of pavement was an essential factor for risk management. When ash reuse strategies were made based on a focus on the stage of reuse, the rank of strategies were shown to be different from the one based on the total population risks over the entire life cycle. This demonstrated the importance of decision criteria used in selecting reuse strategies. The results also showed that when bottom ash was reused, the health risk was shifted to the laborers; the individual risks of laborers were higher than residents through exposure to Cr and Cd via inhalation and dermal contact. Although the population risk at the treatment stage was the highest, the smaller size of exposed population would make it quite effective to reduce the risk of the laborers.