Metham, M and Benjaoran, V (2015) The assessment of greenhouse gas emissions for evaluating actual road construction operations. In: Raiden, A and Aboagye-Nimo, E (eds.) Proceedings of 31st Annual ARCOM Conference, 7-9 September 2015, Lincoln, UK.
Abstract
Assessment of greenhouse gas emissions of products using the life cycle inventory analysis (LCI), can be performed in both the pre- and/or post-construction phases of road construction. For the pre-construction phase, a bill of quantity (BOQ) is used to calculate emissions, whereas, in the post-construction phase, emission calculations are based on the actual work done. Road construction is one of the construction sectors which requires long project time and a great deal of machinery. The actual amount of total resources used is probably different from that which is stated in the BOQ. In general, greenhouse gas assessments consider only data from either the pre-construction phase or the post-construction phase. However, it is possible to control and monitor actual resource-utilization by comparing change at the post-construction phase in relation to the pre-construction phase. This can reveal construction operation performance and lead to the development of methods or construction operations resulting in a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The current research uses three road construction projects as case studies. It aims to improve the EIO-based inventory calculations of machinery used in road construction by adjusting the proportion of usage hours for that machinery. It achieves this by comparing actual data relating to energy, materials and machinery consumption with BOQ data. The results of this comparison help to identify the factors and causes that influence operational performance (in terms of greenhouse gas emissions) and lead to improvements in road construction operations. The key findings from emission calculation between pre and post-construction phases were that the project A had decreased the greenhouse gas emissions by 3.8%, contradictory with project B and C which had increased more gas emissions by 5.0% and 0.6% respectively. Considering with these figures it is reflected the resource management efficiency of each project. The main cause of greenhouse gas emissions on each project was the usage machinery which depended on the project period.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | greenhouse gas; monitoring; resource-utilization; road construction |
| Index terms: | life cycle, gas emission, pre-construction, construction operation, efficiency, inventory, case study, bills of quantities, consumption, construction sector, construction phase, greenhouse gas, resource management, monitoring, greenhouse gas emission, road construction |
| Subjects: | data collection methods, value management, control systems, climate science, consumer economics, financial and cost management, project delivery, construction operations, performance management, civil engineering, inventory management, environmental health, industry analysis |
| Topics: | Quality Management, Supply Chain Management, Site Management, Cost Management, Research Practice, Project Management, Engineering Principles, Stakeholder Management, Sustainability |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCTE |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here