US building materials industry: R and D barriers assessment

Abstract

US building material manufacturers are the primary source of building construction research and development (R D) in the US. Compared with other mature industries, construction-related R D spending is low. This low level of spending shows that significant barriers to private sector building materials R D exist. Through an extensive literature search and discussions with industry, 27 barriers to private sector building materials R D were identified. These barriers were then assessed against two criteria: their susceptibility to the influence of the Department of Energy (DOE) and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and their criticality to industry. The result was the development of a barrier assessment matrix, which prioritized the barriers by placing them into one of four relatively ranked sets: primary, secondary, exploratory, or marginal barriers. Those barriers that could not be influenced by DOE/ORNL were eliminated from further assessment by this process; those that could be influenced were prioritized to give DOE/ORNL a relative sense of their importance to industry and to the building energy conservation goals of DOE/ORNL. The results of this assessment show that DOE/ORNL should give immediate consideration to three primary barriers: lack of adequate measurement methods, lower perceived priority of energy conservation, and highmore » cost of substantiating product performance. This assessment has also shown that DOE/ORNL, through the sponsorship of research activities, has a critical role to play in the reduction of building material R D barriers and in stimulating private sector efforts in building construction research. 34 refs., 8 figs., 15 tabs.« less