This dissertation aims to investigate the sustainability impacts of alternative vehicle technologies and develop comprehensive sustainability assessment frameworks to analyze potential impacts of these vehicles in the U.S. In order to assess sustainability impact of vehicle alternatives, life-cycle based models has been extensively used in the literature. Although life cycle-based models are often used for environmental impacts of alternative vehicles, analysis of social and economic impacts of these vehicles has gained a tremendous interest. In this regard, there is a growing interest among the international platform and academia to use the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment framework to have more informed sustainable products, material and technology choices by considering the environmental, as well as social and economic impacts. The Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment framework is still under development and there is an ongoing research to advance it for future applications. In this dissertation, current and future needs of sustainability assessment frameworks and the U.S. transportation are identified and addressed. The major research gaps are identified as follows: (1) there has been small emphasis on effects of spatial and temporal variations on the sustainability impacts of alternative vehicle technologies, (2) no national research efforts as of now have been directed specifically toward understanding the fundamental relationship between the adoption of electric vehicles and water demand, (3) there has been a lack of understanding the dynamic complexity of transportation sustainability, encompassing feedback mechanisms, and interdependencies, for the environmental, social, and economic impacts of alternative vehicles, and (4) there is no emphasis on addressing uncertainties inherent to the U.S. transportation and its complex relationships with the environment, society, and economy. The environmental, economic, and social impacts of alternative vehicles are highly critical for truly assessing and understanding the long-term sustainability of vehicles and propose economically viable, socially acceptable, and environmentally-friendly transportation solutions for U.S. passenger transportation. This dissertation provides a more comprehensive sustainability assessment framework by realizing following objectives: (1) inclusion of spatial and temporal variations when quantifying carbon, energy, and water footprints of alternative vehicle technologies, (2) quantifying environmental, social, and economic impacts of alternative vehicle technologies, (3) capturing the dynamic relations among the parameters of U.S. transportation system, environment, society, and the economy, (4) dealing with uncertainties inherent to the U.S. transportation sector considering the complexity of the system and dynamic relationships. The results of this dissertation reveal that the results with consideration of uncertainties, temporal and spatial variations, and dynamic complex relationships among the system variables can be significantly different than those of without consideration of those. Therefore, when developing policies the robustness of proposed scenarios should be valuated with consideration of uncertainties, temporal and spatial variations as well as the dynamic feedback mechanisms. The outcomes of this study can pave the way for advancement in the state-of-the-art and state-of-the-practice in the sustainability research by presenting novel approaches to deal with uncertainties and complex systems.

The impact of technology is increasing in the automotive industry resulting in user experience to have a significant role in the industry. Previous studies have researched the use of user experience in the automotive industry describing the importance of it. Studies have also described the user experience in connection to in-vehicle functions. Contrariwise, a gap has been identified in relation to the actual use and users’ preferences to these functions. The aim of this study is to analyze the users’ perspective in the automotive industry and how a high level of user experience can be achieved by identifying the preference of the users. This paper aims to identify if functions related to entertainment or functions related to functionality are preferred by the users. It is important to note that the study is not excluding any of the two different type of functions but investigates the preference of the users. Mixed method was used to respond to the research question. Two interviews with experts of the domain of automotive were conducted, where important aspects of the experts’ perspective were covered and was used to develop the survey. In order to achieve a full understanding of the user experience, a survey was sent to identify users’ preferences. The study proved user experience to be important for the organizations in the automotive industry. Moreover, it discovered a discrepancy between the experts’ perspective and the users’ perceptions. Experts expressed customer satisfactions and fulfillment of their demands to be of the primary aim of organizations in the automotive industry. Contrariwise, users expressed that organizations may consider the preference of the users but only to achieve economic and concurrent benefits. Additionally, users expressed a preference to in-vehicle functions related to functionality. More specifically, in-vehicle functions in relation to safety, connectivity and assistance in driving. As a result, this study suggests for organizations in the automotive industry to include the above functions to their vehicles in order to satisfy the demands of their customers and achieve high level of user experience but not exclude the functions related to entertainment.