Life-Cycle Environmental Cost Simulation for Building Construction: A comparison of prefabrication and cast-in-place work

• Main Authors: KUAN-CHIH YEH, 葉冠志
• Other Authors: Jui-Sheng Chou
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2012
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/nbujes

碩士 === 國立臺灣科技大學 === 營建工程系 === 100 === The construction industry has a myriad of complex influences on the environment, most notable being the effect of CO2 emissions. Over the past decade, decisions in the construction industry have been based on economic costs, with no consideration for environmental protection. However, in the past few years, companies have slowly recognized the importance of the effects of building lifecycles on the environment in addition to the original focus of maximizing profit. Thus, in this study, we propose a CO2 emission evaluation system and an environmental cost calculation method for building lifecycles to provide a reference for policymakers when conducting primary environment risk evaluations for building construction. For this study, we selected a shopping center building as an example to investigate the use of prefabrication and cast-in-place work at various ratios and compare the effects that CO2 emissions have on the building lifecycle from the production and transportation stage to the demolition stage. Fossil fuel, electricity, and water use were employed used to simulate the confidence interval range of CO2 emissions in building lifecycles. At the end of this study, we present an evaluation of environmental costs. The analysis results show that if a building has an estimated usage limit of 50 years, its carbon dioxide emission rate will reach an average prefabrication rate of 7110.79kg-CO2/m2 and cast-in-place rate of 7222.42 kg-CO2/m2. Regarding environmental costs, the environmental costs of cast-in-place work is increased to exceed the prefabrication work by 0.61 dollars/yr-m2. For scale of 37411.72 m2, the environmental costs of cast-in-place work is exceed the prefabrication work by 22,821 dollars each year. For present value, cast-in-place work is exceed the prefabrication work by 735,608 dollars. Therefore, the prefabrication work for the construction of the structure is more in line the environmental cost-effectiveness. The environmental cost evaluation model and procedures proposed in this study can be applied to other building methods and related industries to evaluate their effects on the environment.