Enhancing sustainability of construction projects through waste minimization

Abstract

Construction activity is a critical indicator of development. As developmental activities in emerging countries are increasing, the construction industry is being viewed with increased interest as an area which needs sustainable practices. The construction industry uses 55% of the wood cut for non-fuel uses and 40 % of the world’s energy and a large proportion of the material manufactured can be traced to buildings and their construction. To make construction sustainable, all of its stages from conception to deconstruction need to be considered with the viewpoint of waste minimization. This paper looks at the execution stage of a construction project and seeks to identify the sources of waste generation at the planning and execution stage. A detailed field study and subsequent root cause analysis of the execution planning process has been done to identify the factors that lead to erratic and variable execution performance and thus create waste in the form of inventory and rework. An attempt has been made to study, categorize and quantify waste related to MEP works on building sites which typically account for about 40% of the project construction cost. The studies have incorporated expert views, interviews with on-site personnel, study of documents and actual field sampling. Based on the observations, multiple solution concepts has been proposed. The proposed solutions aim at reducing the generation of waste through better execution planning and control.