Australian Construction Sector Research Articles

Can the Hemp Industry Improve the Sustainability Performance of the Australian Construction Sector?

Sustainable construction should navigate the trade-offs between minimising pressure on scarce resources and the environment and maximising economic viability and human wellbeing through the whole building lifetime. In the pursuit of improving the environmental performance of the construction sector, there is growing interest in substituting conventional materials with bio-based materials. In the last decade, the use of industrial hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) as an aggregate for bio-based materials has attracted significant attention because of its ability to sequester carbon dioxide (CO2) during plant development, its fast-growing nature, the reduced level of agricultural input requirements and its good technical properties, which could potentially result in better sustainability performance across their life cycle. This review discusses the outcomes published in the scientific literature that have dealt with the use of hemp-based construction materials in the global and Australian construction sectors, with particular emphasis on the evaluation of their sustainability aspects (i.e., environmental, economic and social) throughout their lifetime. Relevant studies were identified from a structured keyword search in the Scopus database. The results found that research on hemp-based materials has mainly focused on assessing the environmental dimension, with an emphasis on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and little consideration for economic and social aspects. The existing literature showed a strong geographical bias towards Europe; thus, the outcomes of the life cycle studies conducted may not be representative of Australia. In that line, the development of a region specific of the life cycle sustainability approach is recommended to evaluate whether hemp-based construction materials can assist in achieving GHG targets in a sustainable manner in Australia.

The Mental Health of Migrant Workers in the Australian Construction Sector: A Literature Review

The Mental Health of Migrant Workers in the Australian Construction Sector: A Literature Review

Global Policy Review on Embodied Flows: Recommendations for Australian Construction Sector

There has been a call for the construction industry to become more energy efficient in its planning and activities, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to help combat climate change. The Australian Building Codes Board has implemented ‘Energy Efficiency’ standards through the National Construction Codes to direct the industry towards net zero emissions goals. However, the Board has maintained a focus on operational flows considerations despite this only being a part of the total expenditure in a building lifecycle. Embodied flows, the energy output, and emissions from harvesting, manufacturing, transporting, and manufacturing materials for a building have not been included as a part of the current standards despite their growing share in the outputs of construction. A qualitative document analysis using data from academic articles and industry publications was performed to identify the context in embodied policy development. Findings reveal an abundance of different legislations and initiatives globally, recommending techniques that may effectively achieve embodied flow reductions. The results highlighted that Australia needs to capitalize on the potential reductions in overall energy and emissions from construction. Other regions have provided a strategic and legislative basis for the industry to emulate.

BUILDING INFORMATION MODELLING UPTAKE BY SMALL TO MEDIUM-SIZED CONTRACTORS: A CHANGE MANAGEMENT PERSPECTIVE

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is not popularly used by small to medium-sized enterprises (SME) in the Australian construction sector. While the strengths and benefits of adopting BIM were well documented, previous studies rarely delved into explaining why many SMEs resist changing their practices. This paper adopts a qualitative approach and presents a review study that seeks to identify the resistive factors of BIM adoption among SMEs contractors. A comprehensive review on the secondary sources was conducted to reveal the roots of resistance and explore the change management theories and techniques they can apply to facilitate the BIM adoption and implementation process. It is found that ‘company buy-in’, ‘educational’ and ‘resource’ factors are the most common resistive barriers. In addition, two change management techniques, namely Process Orientated System, and Manage, Change and Dependency (MCDP) Toolkit are suggested to help SMEs to take their first steps to embrace with the use of BIM.

Mental health in the construction industry: an interview with Australia’s MATES in construction CEO, Jorgen Gullestrup

ABSTRACT Research in Australia and internationally indicates that construction work is linked to higher suicide rates. Higher rates are associated with irregular, intense and remote working, as well as labour force demographics. Through the organization MATES in Construction, the Australian construction sector has become a world-leader in researching and seeking to address the problem of suicide in the sector. This contribution is an edited version of an interview carried out between the lead author and Jorgen Gullestrop, CEO of Mates in Construction in Queensland and Northern Territory, Australia. The interview took place during Jorgen’s February 2020 visit to Newfoundland and Labrador (NL), Canada, on the opposite side of the world. There has been very little research or active mobilization around suicide in construction in Canada. During his visit, Jorgen spent a week with the NL Construction Safety Association’s membership. The interview provides important insights into the Australian construction industry as it operated when Jorgen first came to Australia from Denmark in the 1980s. It also provides insights into the structure of the industry today, including how it is organized around precarious employment. Jorgen touches on the origins of MATES, how the MATES program works, and why, although Jorgen came out of the union movement, MATES was established as an independent charity separate from employers and unions. The interview includes reflections on gender, suicide and MATES, and on the importance of academic research to the MATES agenda.

Productivity enablers and inhibiting health and wellbeing practices of South Australian construction site-based workers: a qualitative study

This study is aimed at analyzing the perceptions of South Australian construction site-based blue-collared workers on the enablers and inhibiting health and wellbeing practices, establish their impact on the physical abilities, safety performance and overall productivity of older workers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 construction practitioners. Content analysis and associated techniques of word frequency analysis and coding were used for data analysis. The findings showed some consensus on the factors affecting the health and wellbeing practices with obesity, smoking and higher alcohol consumption among the risk factors and prevalent lifestyles among the workers. The ‘weather’ was identified among the highly ranked physical factors affecting productivity. The study also established the higher prevalence of health and, mental issues, injuries and recreational usage of drugs among the workers. Solutions are proposed for overcoming the identified inhibiting practices. This study was the first research to investigate the perceptions of South Australian construction site-based workers on the enablers and inhibiting health and wellbeing practices and associated consequences among older workers within the South Australian construction sector. The findings of this study offer insights in terms of creating awareness of the degrading health and well-being of construction workers, in particular, the ageing workforce.

Life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions assessment: An Australian commercial building perspective

To fulfil the hunger for sustainable development, Australian construction sector seems to contemplate toward green design. Green-Star environmental rating system, one of the active building rating systems in Australia, has also been employed in New Zealand, and South Africa. To help engineers and designers obtain comprehensive visualisation on sustainable projects, this paper develops a model to evaluate energy consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions based on typical Australian commercial building alternatives. From that, this paper explains how to achieve points for “Energy” and “Life-cycle impacts” categories of this rating system. The model uses GaBi 8.1 platforms and shows relationships between building's energy consumption, and greenhouse-gas emissions released during the building lifetime.This paper provides insight into life-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions assessment for several typical commercial building fabrics in Australia. The developed model can also be conveniently modified to automate calculations for other credits under the Green-Star environmental rating system, and other environmental rating systems around the world. The study suggests that designers should consider the inverse relationship between building envelopes' total R-value with energy consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions. Another finding shows that materials used for building envelopes play a significant role to manage energy consumption as well as greenhouse-gas emissions amount during the building's life-cycle.

Causes and mitigation for declining productivity in the Australian mid-rise residential construction sector

Purpose The construction industry is a significant driver of economic activity in many countries. However, there has been a lack of growth in productivity within the Australian construction sector over recent years. The purpose of this paper is to gain an in-depth understanding of the causes for declining productivity within the Australian mid-rise residential construction network. Design/methodology/approach Two in-depth case studies have been conducted with a builder and developer, both significant entities of the Australian mid-rise residential construction network. Case study data collection comprised a five-stage process including semi-structured interviews and archival information review. Findings Drivers for declining construction productivity were identified under the categories of: industry-, firm- and project-level productivity. The drivers include: incomplete documentation, design changes, inefficient project management, supply chain fragmentation, among others. Originality/value The contribution of this study is the identification and categorisation of major issues impacting sector productivity along the mid-rise residential construction supply chain. The research identified that the substructure and superstructure are the construction phases during which most productivity losses occur. Mitigations are discussed in terms of systemic sector productivity increases at an industry, firm and project levels.

The Carbon Footprint of Australia's Construction Sector

Australia accounts for just 0.33% of the world's population yet it is one of the highest emitters of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per capita in the world. The construction sector is a substantial area for mitigation efforts in Australia because of its economic importance and its involvement with indirect GHG emissions, i.e. those embodied in construction supply chains, including construction materials and electricity use. While the majority of policies and regulations focus on reducing direct emissions from buildings, more attention needs to be paid to the embodied emissions of the whole sector as these can take up anywhere between 10% and 97% of the whole life-cycle carbon emissions.This study aims at unravelling the total carbon footprint of the construction sector in Australia from 2009 to 2013, identifying the key contributing supply chains, industries and products. An economy wide input-output (IO) analysis is performed using a collaborative, cloud-based data platform – the Industrial Ecology Virtual Laboratory (IELab). This allows for a detailed disaggregation of sectors and permits more refined analysis as well as benchmarking against other sectors in the economy.Results for CO2e emissions by final demand show the construction sector makes up 18.1% of Australia's carbon footprint, compared to only 1.9% of direct emissions in 2013. The largest contributors to these embodied emissions are electricity, water & waste and materials throughout the years. Results are also broken down by detailed construction activities in residential / non-residential, road & bridge, other heavy and civil engineering and construction services. Mitigation options for electricity supply and materials use in the Australian construction sector are suggested.

A qualitative examination of major barriers in implementation of reverse logistics within the South Australian construction sector

Despite extensive research on the benefits of reverse logistics (RL), it has yet to become commonplace in the construction industry. Furthermore, the uptake and number of studies on RL remains very limited within the Australian context and particularly related to the construction industry. This paper is aimed at filling that knowledge gap by employing an exploratory approach to examine the critical barriers faced by South Australian construction organizations in implementing RL practices. Semi-structured interviews and a ranking approach facilitated the treatment of qualitative data through quantitative coding using cloud-based applications. The research identified 12 barriers to RL implementation, four of them very significant according to the responses of the interviewees: the regulatory environment, additional costs involved, lack of recognition in the construction supply chain, and extra effort required. The study also explored their inter-relationships through the Co-occurrence Index. The study proposes some remedial measures for RL implementation in South Australia based on the barriers identified.

Safety training evaluation: The case of construction induction training and the impact on work-related injuries in the Western Australian construction sector

This paper presents the findings of an evaluation of the mandatory Construction Induction Training initiative (CIT). The paper details a pilot study conducted in 2010 with the commercial construction sector and a subsequent study in 2011 of the housing and civil sectors conducting business in the metropolitan area of Perth and in regional Western Australia. The international literature on safety training evaluations and the impact on safety performance is reviewed. We argue that formal evaluation of safety training and evidence of a link with safety culture improvement is limited. The analysis of the study includes discussion of the transfer of safety knowledge through training participation into the construction safety culture. The findings include evidence of a decreasing trend in work-related injuries and significant support for the CIT. Participants were supportive of the mandatory nature of the CIT and believed that the training had not only increased their personal safety awareness but had also contributed to a positive improvement in the safety culture in construction worksites and in the industry. Although the training has been designed for construction workers there is evidence of extended uptake of the CIT as a generic safety course for preparation for those wishing to work in the other industry sectors.

Innovate or Perish? Exploring some of the Myths of Construction Innovation

The construction innovation literature suggests that managers face a stark choice. They can innovate or perish in the face of growing global competition and an increasingly uncertain and dynamic world. Innovation is presented as a key area of reform needed to raise business performance, yet at the same time it is argued that Australia is falling behind in the global innovation stakes. Evidence suggests that the Australian Construction sector is a poor innovation performer when compared to all-industry averages and contributes relatively little to the national innovation effort. Drawing on international innovation research, this paper argues that these views are overly simplistic and explores some of the myths that surround the process in the construction industry. Through interviews with some of Australia’s leading innovators and policy-makers it suggests that many of the factors that are said to drive innovation are not as straight forward as they may seem. There are important qualifications to consider and it would seem that construction innovation is a highly interactive and amorphous process, involving many people with multiple interests dealing with day-to-day challenges.Keywords: Innovation, opportunism, strategy, risk.

Driving carbon reduction strategies adoption in the Australian construction sector – The moderating role of organizational culture

In recent years, numbers of strategies were advocated to foster carbon reduction in built environment. However, few studies have acknowledged that strategies adoption is a matter of organizational culture (OC). In this study, a conceptual model that depicts the hypothesized relationship among carbon reduction drivers, strategies adoption and OC is developed. The model is then tested with data collected via a survey conducted in Australia. The results suggest that the significant relationship between the carbon tax and the adoption of carbon reduction strategies can be further enhanced by OC in terms of goal clarity, rewards, and innovation. Surprisingly, stringent regulations may not necessarily induce adoption of carbon reduction strategies in built environment even if OC exists.

Can a Carbon Tax Push the Australian Construction Sector toward Self-Regulation? Lessons Learned from European Union Experiences

In Australia, the introduction of a carbon tax has been coined as a righteous response to climate change. However, recent industry reports indicate that construction practitioners are opposed to the carbon tax and argue that it would be revenue-neutral. Whereas anecdotal evidence and facts about the effect of a carbon tax coexist, pragmatic solutions may be difficult to collate. This paper reports research intended to investigate the effects of the carbon tax on the Australian construction sector. Lessons learned from the European Union (EU) were reviewed. The findings from the literature review suggest that the carbon tax may provide a positive impulse for benchmarking emissions driven from construction activities. However, the experience from the EU also indicates that in response to the new tax, carbon emission-intensive industries such as construction are keen to find leeway to evade their responsibility. Whereas the carbon tax may arouse concerns within the construction sector, such concerns may not necessarily be integrated with behavioral change.

The politics of sameness in the Australian construction industry

PurposeAustralian construction sites are culturally diverse workplaces. This paper aims to compare operative and manager attitudes towards cultural diversity on Australian construction sites, and to examine the strategies that are used to manage it.Design/methodology/approachA face‐to‐face questionnaire survey was undertaken of 1,155 construction operatives and 180 supervisors on Australian construction sites.FindingsThe vast majority of operatives and managers are comfortable with cultural diversity. However, there is some anxiety about cultural diversity, especially around safety risks, and there is evidence of racism. Those concerns are more keenly perceived by operatives than by managers. Both operatives and managers see some of the negative issues (discrimination, racist joke telling) as inevitable daily outcomes of cultural diversity on sites. The normalisation of these negative forms of cross‐cultural interaction reveals a pessimistic disposition towards cultural diversity. Cultural diversity policy, and programs, are not seen as a priority by managers, and some see such strategies (e.g. affirmative action plans) as discriminatory, and unfair, since they may favour some groups over others.Originality/valueNo research has compared operative and management attitudes towards cultural diversity in the Australian construction sector. This paper provides a first glimpse into the value attributed to cultural diversity programs by managers within construction sites. These insights will be of value to managers and supervisors who have to manage multicultural workforces in the construction industry. Conceptually, the paper reveals how the “politics of sameness” are hegemonic within the construction industry, presenting as an a priori anxiety towards difference, the normalising of poor cross‐cultural relations, the non‐prioritising of policies to better manage cultural diversity or their ad hoc adoption.

The Australian Construction Linkages in the 1990s

During the 1990s, the construction sector played an important role with its growing contributions to the gross national product, gross domestic product and employment in the Australian economy. Using the newly released 1998–99 input-output table and four previously published tables by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, this paper aims to measure the sectoral linkages of the Australian construction sector in the 1990s in relation to other industrial countries. Results describe the increase in construction volume was mainly due to the increase in governmental and non-residential construction expenditures and lagging construction technology. The technical level of the non-residential construction sub-sector was a drag to the total construction, while the non-residential construction sub-sector presented a stronger economic push than that of the residential construction sub-sector. In the 1990s, the inputs and outputs' components of the construction sector were stable. The linkages of the Australian construction sector are discussed from an international point of view.

Indirect Discrimination in Construction Organizations and the Impact on Women’s Careers

Over the last 20 years, equality legislation and positive action on diversity has increased awareness of the detrimental impact of sex discrimination and has begun to address harassment and inequality in many large organizations. While this may yield positive benefits for underrepresented groups working within the construction industry, it remains to be seen whether this legislative drive has overcome indirect forms of discrimination brought about by the ingrained culture and working practices of the sector. This paper explores the impact of indirect discrimination by systematically combining the results of two research projects which explored perspectives on women's careers in the industry. The first examined the ways in which women's careers were affected by the nature of working practices within the U.K. construction industry, while the second explored gendered perspectives on work-life balance within the context of the Australian construction sector. Taken in combination, the findings provide prima facie evidence of how construction companies disadvantage women's careers through their work practices and cultures. Based on this evidence, this paper develops a grounded proposition that the ingrained structures and work cultures of the sector, combined with women's restricted occupational choices, stymie attempts to create an equitable workplace environment. Suggestions are made as to how construction companies can encourage the structural and cultural shift necessary to overcome the corrosive effect of indirect discrimination on women's careers in the future.