The construction industry has a pivotal role in tackling global warming by reducing carbon emissions across the lifecycle of the built environment and achieving net zero. Dr Omar Abo Madyan, research associate at the Centre for Smart Infrastructure & Construction, calls for the use of data-driven insights for resource-efficient decision-making
Globally, the construction sector is responsible for 38% of energy-related carbon emissions and 50% of resource consumption (Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction 2019 – Analysis – IEA.; The Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment – World Green Building Council). Currently, the industry is facing a paradigm shift towards sustainability with the current mandate to achieve net zero by 2050. However, the sector is widely criticised for lagging behind other industries when it comes to productivity, efficiency and digitalisation.
Construction faces specific sector-related challenges to digital adoption strategies where every project is unique, geographically varied and involves multiple stakeholders across the value chain. Such factors add difficulty to existing technological barriers that hinder the widespread adoption of digital technologies. However, overcoming these difficulties is key because the successful adoption of digital technologies is crucial for increasing material efficiency and reducing carbon emissions.
Transforming construction through smarter information
The Cambridge Centre for Smart Infrastructure & Construction (CSIC) works with industry and partner organisations to transform infrastructure through smarter information – learning from the real performance of our built environment assets and infrastructure systems to inform how we design, construct, manage and operate them – to add value to industry and address increasingly urgent challenges, including mitigating the effects of climate change, resilience and resource constraints.
As part of a portfolio of projects, CSIC is investigating the role of data in improving concrete efficacy. Concrete is a significant contributor to global carbon emissions, mainly emerging from the primary ingredient, cement, which is responsible for 7% of global emissions.
While effective efforts have been made in engineering cementitious materials using supplementary cementing materials (SCMs) and optimising alternative fuels for cement manufacturing, the carbon emission directly released from the chemical process of clinker production is difficult to prevent.
While ongoing research on carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) technologies to mitigate such emissions is promising, the full capacity and scale of such future technologies remain to be realised. With the urgent need to tackle global warming and prevent extreme temperature shifts, it is critical to transform how we use concrete and to minimise waste.
You can’t manage what you can’t measure
Data recording processes have not seen significant improvements across the construction industry and some processes, such as concrete delivery tickets, are still paper based. This can hinder understanding of the magnitude of waste and the process of determining its root causes.
That said, collecting data across the industry comes with challenges. The industry is already using a significant amount of data, including measurements, material quantities and BIM inputs. However, due to the industry’s fragmented nature, data is often segregated on different platforms, limiting any additional value from the data. Digital tools designed to enable open collaboration between organisations, identify accurate process flows and bring new perspectives and insights on securing material efficiency are needed.
Using data-driven insights to learn more about how concrete is used
CSIC has developed and deployed digital tools to gather data from a number of major national infrastructure projects to learn more about how concrete is used. Continuous improvement thinking has been applied across the value chain to compare the actual performance of concrete systems and processes to a first principle best performance.
An initial investigation of input and output data will identify the extent to which concrete is providing value in the system, and further establish data gaps on how and where concrete is used. This also allows for more effective data collection as effort is only placed where potential improvements could be made.
Collecting and analysing data sets enables greater efficiency
Several aspects of the studied projects have been investigated, including over-ordering, rework, rejected concrete, over-specification, concrete batching accuracy and waste. Collecting and analysing such data sets makes it possible to identify inefficient processes that would otherwise be deemed business as usual – and remain unchallenged and unchanged.
Results to date have shown high inconsistencies between design volumes and how much concrete is consumed. The yield of concrete – the amount which was actually used efficiently on site – varied between 61% and 97% for individual concrete components, while delivered concrete strengths could be more than double the required design strengths. Such inconsistencies result in a waste of valuable resources and directly increase carbon emissions due to higher cement usage. These valuable insights from data can inform better carbon choices, improve best practice methods and reduce the associated cost of using more materials than necessary.
Accurate data can provide immediate insights
This research will exploit learnings from concrete to other materials and processes across the industry. With such extensive datasets and new analysis, it will be possible to influence material consumption, design codes and standards and produce more accurate carbon models.
There is no silver bullet to tackle all the carbon emissions in the construction industry but rather a combination of different technologies. However, accurate data can provide immediate insights and enable actions to improve material efficiency across the industry to reduce carbon emissions.
For more information please visit: www.centreforsmartinfrastructure.com
Dr Omar Abo Madyan
Research associate
Centre for Smart Infrastructure & Construction
www-smartinfrastructure.eng.cam.ac.uk
