Material Selection, Construction Activities and Waste Management Strategies for
Minimizing the Environmental Impact in Construction Management
Bi Shaonan, Lin Yixuan & Zheng Zhiyuan|sbi2@gmu.edu, ylin19@gmu.edu & zzheng4@gmu.edu
Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering | George Mason University
INTRODUCTION
Currently, the construction industry growths rapidly while the traditional construction
management concentrates on the revenue [2]. But the building construction
influence a lot to the human life quality, which is not just from the economic and
social impact, but it is the environmental pollution affects human beings health.
According to new research, the construction sector contributes to 23% of air
pollution, 50% of the climatic change, 40% of drinking water pollution, and 50% of
landfill wastes [10]. In addition, the construction industry accounts for 40% of
worldwide energy usage, the rate is also high in the U.S.. With estimations that by
2030 emissions from commercial buildings will grow by 1.8% [10]. There is a lack of
consideration of the environmental issues, which leads to unsuitable of the old
construction management style so that the sustainable construction management
appears and becomes recently popular.
Figure 1. Environmental Impacts from Construction and Other Sectors [10]
Figure 2. U.S. Energy Consumption by Sector [15]
The sustainable construction management means using low-cost technologies and
clean-resources to build constructions to expand the benefits and reduce the harm
to the environmental, social and economic impact from the stages of construction
material selection, construction activities and waste management processes [2, 3].
Increasing number of studies found lots of strategies to reduce the environmental
impacts, nonetheless, there are few studies focus on the analysis to consider their
feasibility in all stages of construction. Actually, some of the sustainable
construction methods are not always practical [1].Thus, the purpose of this
research is to identify the environmental impacts caused from each construction
stage and analyze the sustainable strategies existing in the previous research to
counter the environmental impact during construction phase, in addition, we also
recommend some improved strategies to minimize and balance the environmental
impacts. Thus, our research question is: How does the construction management
affect the environment in the stages of material selection, construction activity, and
waste management? Additionally, what actions could balance the environmental
impact and apply to all the stages during the construction phase?
THREE STAGES:
Construction Material
Construction material is the most basic element which the construction
industry most relies on. Every year, almost three billion tons of raw
material are used into constructions industry, which is 40% of the global
material consuming from economic perspective [4]. In the United States,
the production and processing of construction material will consume
enormous amounts of electricity, generate 30% national output of
greenhouse gas with air pollution and using 12% national potable water
[4]. According to the demand of cement production, the CO2 emission
from cement production is estimated to increase 100% from year 2006 to
2020 [11]. As one of the major users of resources and source of
generating pollution on environment, the construction industry should
take more sustainable actions and strategies on selecting material [5].
Construction Activities
The construction activity was the process that contained all the
construction, site and site activities and decisions that start with
construction / manufacturing contracting continue with initial operations,
final performance testing and completion of facilities transfer [6]. All of
fundamental activities could influence the environment significantly,
especially the Greenhouse Gas emission, the noise impact and the energy
waste. Firstly, 2% of the Greenhouse Gas emission is from the construction
activities in the U.S. [12]. 6% of the Greenhouse Gas emission, about 131
million metric tons CO2 per year, generated from the construction site [13].
Secondly, the noise impact generated by the construction process during
the nighttime has disturb the people live or work near the cites [14].
Finally, construction activities took 7-10% of total energy usage in Europe
and U.S. [9]. And the Energy use inevitably accompanies energy waste,
because there is no machine that can achieve 100% energy efficiency.
Thus, there should be the sustainable actions taken during the
construction activities to reduce the environmental impacts.
C & D Waste Management
Construction and Demolition (C&D) waste, has nine main categories,
which are concrete, wood, nonferrous and ferrous metals, cardboard,
plastic, glass, paper, and drywall [7]. The two main environmental impacts
caused by C&D waste are Greenhouse Gas emissions and energy
consumption [8]. Additionally, the waste disposal process will also release
toxic gas, produce hazardous waste and pollute the groundwater [7].
Thus, C&D waste management is for well managing these groups of waste
to meet the environmental goals [8]. Research shows three main waste
management process, which are recycling, landfilling and incineration,
have different impact on the environment [7]. There has a negative result
for saving water and reducing Greenhouse Gas emissions while recycling
wood and concrete [7]. Also, research indicated conventional landfilling
cannot save any resources or reduce the Greenhouse Gas emissions [7].
For secondary waste management, it is better to incinerate due to the
heat recovery [7].
DISCUSSION
Sustainable construction management should be a coherent process, which contrary
to focusing on one stage, but combines material selection, construction activities and
waste management together to more effectively reduce environmental impact. From
this research, (1) material selection stage shows an urgent situation to use the
recyclable or mixture materials. The same as stage of material selection, waste
recycling is one of the best strategies in C&D waste management. Since there is few
research indicates the influences on the environment by using recycled materials in
the construction stage. It is possible to recycle C&D waste, then process them become
recycled construction materials. (2) Also, from the materials perspective, it is better to
think about how the materials transportation and usage affect the environment.
Same under construction activities consideration, transportation has been recognized
as the noise pollution to the surrounding area. In the waste management, it also
mentioned about the indirect environmental impact of the transportation, which will
lead to the greenhouse gas emissions and fuel consumption. (3) Additionally, both
material selection and waste management stages suggested combining computer
science and construction together to estimate the environmental impact. (4) At last,
due to the significant effect of waste classified treatment, it is better to identify the
material selection and construction activities, which include on-site waste disposal.
In this research, we balance each of the environmental impacts to give four highly
recommended strategies and are showed as followed
Environmental Greenhouse Gas Energy Noise Water Other
impacts/ Emission Saving Reduction Saving Pollution
Strategies Reduction Reduction
Recyclable Material
Local Material
Software
Application (VSM)
Waste Classified
Treatment
Table 1. Environmental Impact Reduction by Different Strategies Check List
After we combine three stages together to evaluate the best strategies for the whole
construction project, designer, construction manager, government specification and
future scholar can gain benefit from this research. However, there still some project
stages, such as design and maintenance, we did not cover in this study, therefore,
future research can focus on them. After our research on C&D waste management, it
should be noticed that different types of waste while using either of three waste
management process have the different environmental impact. Thus, it is hard to
determine the best strategy for the whole construction project.
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