Environmental, Economic, and Social Life Cycle Impacts of Alternative Fuel Buses: The Case for Qatar

Abstract

This paper aimed to evaluate three different types of city buses' life cycle, including the manufacturing, shipping, and operation phases. On this basis, this study is applying both a hybrid life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) and multi-objective decision-making to assess two different brands of compressed natural gas (CNG), diesel, and electric buses. This study intends to cover the existing gap in the literature related to the external effects developed from the different fuel buses in Qatar. The results highlighted that adopting the CNG buses favors the social indicators, and they have the lowest life cycle costs. On the other hand, the electric buses support the environmental indicators, and they have slightly higher life cycle costs than CNG buses. The diesel buses had the worst environmental impacts, high social impacts than CNGs, and the highest life cycle costs.