Study on Carbon Emissions from Highway Service-Area Buildings in Different Climatic Regions of China

Unofficial AI-generated summary based on the public title and abstract. Not an official translation.

🔬研究者:Provides a comprehensive life-cycle accounting framework for infrastructure buildings with climate-adaptive optimization, useful for carbon accounting research.

🏢実務担当者:Corporate sustainability teams in highway infrastructure can use the climate-specific design parameters and PV/vegetation offsetting strategies to reduce operational carbon emissions.

🏛政策担当者:Demonstrates the feasibility of net-negative infrastructure buildings, supporting policy on carbon neutrality in transport infrastructure.

Highway service-area buildings are characterized by long operating hours, diverse functional spaces, and considerable energy consumption, resulting in significant life-cycle carbon emissions. This study quantifies life-cycle carbon emissions of the buildings in highway service areas. A life-cycle accounting framework was established, and net emissions were further evaluated by considering the contributions of photovoltaic (PV) electricity and vegetation carbon sinks. Five representative service areas covering hot-summer/cold-winter, severe-cold, cold, temperate, and hot-summer/warm-winter zones were investigated through field surveys and indoor thermal environment measurements to obtain envelope properties, equipment configurations, and operating profiles. Results revealed that life-cycle carbon emissions vary substantially across climatic regions, ranging from 4.31 × 103 to 3.06 × 104 tCO2e. The operational stage accounts for the largest share of total emissions, approximately 61–84%. Heating demand dominates operational emissions in severe-cold and cold regions, whereas cooling and lighting loads become increasingly important in warm and temperate climates. The orthogonal analysis reveals significant differences in the sensitivity of design parameters across climatic regions. After implementing climate-adaptive optimization measures, life-cycle carbon emissions are reduced by 40.35–87.94% in four service areas. In the hot-summer/warm-winter region, the combined effects of PV electricity generation and vegetation carbon sinks maintain a net-negative carbon balance. The findings provide evidence for sustainable highway service-area design by linking life-cycle accounting, climate-specific design priorities, and renewable-energy substitution.

• openalex https://doi.org/10.3390/su18136658first seen 2026-07-03 05:19:17