One of the earliest and most essential decisions that a construction project owner must make is how the project will be delivered. The choice of project delivery system (PDS) dictates project roles and responsibilities, along with when the project contract will be signed and the language therein, so it must be made before collaborative partners are brought on board. The Downstream and Chemical (DCC) sector is no exception to this process. However, much of the existing literature on project delivery systems (PDS) does not accurately reflect the current state of the practice in delivering construction projects.
A dramatic increase in the volume of literature published that concerns PDS over the last 20 years has both fueled and fed off an industry-wide surge in interest in PDS. The last decade in particular has revolutionized this area with greater emphasis placed on collaboration. It is now an industry requirement that collaboration be both imperative to and facilitated by the contracting mechanisms within the PDS itself.
A UW-Madison-led research team developed two major tools to assist owners and stakeholders in the DCC sector during their selection of project delivery systems. The first of these is a concept file that defines success, conditions for application, and obstacles that may be encountered in the use of project delivery systems. The second is an assessment rubric, which provides a scorecard-like system to determine the appropriateness of a given PDS for a project, tailored to the unique needs of the company and project at a specific time. Learn more about this project from the Construction Industry Institute.
Project Sponsor: Construction Industry Institute (CII) Downstream and Chemical Research Sector
Research Team: Awad S. Hanna (PI), Zhenhua Zhu (Co-PI), Jeff Russell (Co-PI), Joe Said (MSCE, UW-Madison class of 2021), Jack Morrison (department staff), and 14 industry partners from firms including ExxonMobil, Georgia Pacific, and Day & Zimmermann.
The execution phase of a construction project is when the most obstacles or issues are typically observed, but in reality, this phase is just the tip of the iceberg. The effectiveness of the execution stage is determined largely by construction planning and control. Part of this process is the Production Strategy Process (PSP), during which a massive volume of information is transferred between and among the project stakeholders. The current PSP in use across the industry is document-focused and largely driven by the issuance of revised drawings. This approach can create gaps in information, if all parties are not working from the same set of documents.
With this challenge in mind, UW researchers developed a system based in Augmented Reality (AR) that pivots from the current document-centric approach to a model-centric approach that leverages Building Information Modeling (BIM). This new approach was validated on real-world job sites and was found to enhance decision making, increase safety integration, reduce errors, and improve project quality.
Project Sponsors: The Boldt Company and The Construction Industry Institute
Research Team: Awad Hanna (PI), Raj Veeramani (Co-PI), and Hala Nassereddine (Ph.D, UW-Madison class of 2019)
In the modern construction sector, there is a tremendous pressure to proceed. Permitting, approvals, and pre-construction delays are often drawn out and tedious, making the notice to proceed a welcome relief. However, a notice to proceed does not ensure a readiness to proceed; and moving forward without sufficient preparation can negatively impact productivity and performance across a variety of construction activities.
An overcautious person might choose to simply wait longer, ensuring readiness through a patient assessment of the facts. At the same time, delaying for too long past the point of readiness has its own set of negative impacts. It is far easier to point to I-beams rising out of the ground as an indicator of progress, than it is to illustrate on a planning board, for example. However, projects that jump the gun are often the ones that end up in litigation due to negative impacts on cost, schedule, productivity, and change. So how can we better determine project readiness and minimize the number of projects that proceed before they are ready?
Our research team set out to tackle this question by considered a large sample size of construction projects, and through a dual-pronged approach of statistical analysis and industry recommendation, defined 228 unique readiness factors which impact the overall readiness of a project. Each factor is simplified to a binary operator (i.e. it either is or is not present). This approach creates an effective framework for industry professionals to quickly and easily assess readiness. To further facilitate this solution and the resulting assessment, the UW-Madison CEM research team has developed an automated tool that can score projects for the user. Learn more about this Construction Readiness Assessment project.
Project Sponsor: Construction Industry Institute (CII) Downstream and Chemical Research Sector
Research Team: Awad S. Hanna (PI), Jeff Russell (Co-PI), Raj Veeramani (Co-PI), Michael Ibrahim (Ph.D, UW-Madison class of 2018), Youssef Labib (MSCE, UW-Madison class of 2019), and Jack Morrison (department staff).
The most common means used to mediate and settle disputes in construction are court claims and litigation, which stems from the nature of risk allocation in construction contracts. Most parties in construction partnerships are typically risk-averse to a point of fault, meaning they seek to allocate as much risk as possible to other parties. This can lead to long, drawn-out discussions to determine which party is responsible for delays, increased costs, and other negative impacts. This landmark book published provides methods to quantify impact to a high degree of accuracy, provides methods to proactively mitigate or avoid claims altogether, and further delves into certain key legal precedents to help contracting parties understand major precedents that may impact their process.
Project Team: Awad Hanna (PI), Jack Morrison (department staff), Lauren Welker (BSCE, class of 2022), Calob Limberg (BSCE, class of 2022), Anson Liow (BSCE, class of 2022), Kenn Sulivan (Ph.D, class of 2004), and Justin Swanson (MSCE, class of 2006).