Quantitative analysis of sustainable cost of prefabricated concrete structures

To explore the implementation effects of prefabricated buildings on the goals of improving efficiency, reducing labor dependence, and reducing pollution emissions, it is necessary to conduct a quantitative analysis on the economic, environmental, and social impacts of prefabricated buildings from the sustainability perspective. Economic evaluation can use direct costs. Environmental impact assessment needs to consider the environmental costs in terms of the production of precast components, equipment fuel consumption, construction dust, and waste emissions. Social impact assessment considers the impact of workplace accidents on workers, noise on the productivity of community and the property value, as well as the impact on government taxation caused by the decline in individual and enterprise incomes. Taking the construction of a prefabricated concrete residential building as an example, the differences in energy, resource consumption, direct cost, environmental cost, and social cost between the prefabricated concrete structure and cast-in-place concrete structure were calculated and compared. Furthermore, the proportion of changes in labor cost, material cost, and equipment cost were analyzed. The impact of regional socioeconomic parameters on the environment and social costs were illustrated. The results show that the total cost of the prefabricated concrete structure is 12%-15% higher than that of the cast-in-place structure, of which the direct cost is about 27% higher, the environmental cost is about 7% higher, and the social cost is more than 90% lower. © 2021, Editorial Office of Journal of Building Structures. All right reserved.