IMPACT OF CONSTRUCTION ACTIVITIES ON ENVIRONMENT

— Rapid industrialization and population explosion in India has led to the migration of peoples from villages to cities which increase human settlement in world's growing cities and towns. This generates several issues with regard to the environment. Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is becoming a very important study before commissioning of any project plan or development in our country. In order to study either its beneficial or harmful effect; evaluation of any project through EIA has become a must; Indian construction industry is rapidly growing at a rate of 9.2% as against the world average of 5.5%. Undertaking EIA for construction industry and improving site management can reduce environmental impacts both on and off site. Several agencies use procedures for EIA of construction projects which might result in significant environmental impacts. The EIA study is necessary to prepare a detailed account of environmental impact of the proposed activity so that appropriate interventions could be taken. An attempt has been made in this paper to study environmental impact of building construction project using computer based analysis methodology. The study focuses on various parameters such as total area, parking area, rainwater harvesting system, basement area, sewage treatment plant, water quality, solid waste, source of water, depth of ground water, distance from the city Centre, nearest sensitive zones and overall settlement density. The plan seeks to define the project in a holistic manner and suggest possible mitigation measures for development. The primary purpose of study is to establish a consensus vision of Eco-friendly of the building environment over the next five years.

2014

In order study either its beneficial or harmful effect; evaluation of any project through EIA has become a must. Indian construction industry is rapidly growing at a rate of 9.2% as against the world average of 5.5%. Undertaking EIA for construction industry and improving site management can reduce environmental impacts both on and off site. In order to appreciate the risks posed by construction activities and taking steps to reduce incidents can help reduce costs and improve business reputation. The present article reviews the various steps involved in EIA, environmental effects of construction industry and EIA with relation to construction industry.

Environmental impact assessment of construction projects is demanded by government of developed nations where the construction industry is regulated. This is however not the case in developing nations where the industry is not regulated. In this research, types and the degree of severity of environmental factors associated with building construction projects in Lagos state of Nigeria was examined. Twenty –eight on-going building projects scattered between Lagos Island and the mainland were randomly selected from each cluster using proportional allocation. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey administered on 3 senior management staff and 7 artisans at each site. The study established raw material consumption and transportation as the most always occurring, most severe construction activity constituting environmental hazard and having the highest impact level on the environment. It was concluded that on-site construction activities have significant impact on the environment across the broad spectrum of, natural resource, ecosystem and public health.

The international journal of construction management, 2019

Building construction tasks generate many environmental impacts during their execution. The assessment and comparison of the ecological effects of different construction tasks can aid in reducing emissions from these tasks. This study introduces an impact assessment methodology to assess the ecological effects of different building construction tasks according to the construction equipment used. In this study, global warming potential (GWP 100), acidification potential (AP), eutrophication potential (EP), photochemical oxidation formation potential (POFP) and human toxicity potential (HTP) are considered as impact categories and evaluated at the global, regional and local levels. A case study of an administrative building in Egypt is used to validate the practicality of the developed model. The results demonstrate that the developed model can efficiently evaluate the ecological effects of construction tasks, and contractors can use it as a tool for choosing ecologically friendly construction strategies.

2nd International conference on Innovative Engineering Technologies (ICIET'2015) August 7-8, 2015 Bangkok (Thailand), 2015

The real estate sector in Bangladesh contributes about 12-15% to its GDP engaging some two million construction workers. Unfortunately these people are exposed to a wide variety of environmental hazards and are vulnerable to most fatal on-the-job injuries. The objective of this paper is to identify the major environmental hazards of construction projects, their causes and effects on our ecosystem. In this study air pollution, water pollution, noise pollution and vibration are addressed. Questioner surveys were conducted at several construction sites during field visit. The result shows that the majority of the respondents consider the pollution due to construction as irritating. Noise pollution is considered as the highest degree of disturbance. Dust of cement and demolition debris is the main cause of air pollution. Vibration does not have significant effects on surroundings. Water borne diseases are prevalent among the construction workers due the lack of supply of potable water and sanitary toilets.

American Journal of Civil Engineering, 2017

This paper deals with the effect of environment in construction work in a particular area. Surrounding environment has immense effect in construction plan, site management, costs and implementation. On the contrary, it affects the workmanship's availability as well as material availability. Moreover, duration of a certain projects also depend on the impact of environment. Effect of climate, rainfall, humidity and temperature are the noticeable fact in the paper. This article represents the environmental effect of a particular place in Rajshahi city of Bangladesh which is known as RUET campus. Outcome of the investigation shows that the significant effect can be observed in the various ingredients of environment as well as construction project.

Construction activities impact on the environment throughout the life cycle of development. These impacts occur from initial work on-site through the construction period, operational period and to the final demolition when a building comes to an end of its life. Even though the construction period is comparatively shorter in relation to the other stages of a building's life, it has diverse significant impacts on the environment. This study investigates the major impacts of construction activities on the environment in Ghana. Thirty-three possible impacts of construction activities on the environment were identified from literature. These impacts were further categorized into nine major groups and were subjected to a cross-sectional survey. Questionnaire and interview were used to elicit the views of respondents. Questionnaires were distributed to 100 randomly selected construction practitioners made up of 58 architects, 37 quantity surveyors and 5 structural engineers registered with their professional bodies. Semi-structured interview was conducted amongst purposively selected contractors and consultants. The respondents were asked to identify the most important environmental impacts. The relative importance of the impacts identified were calculated and ranked by the relative importance index. According to the results of the study, the respondents agreed that resource consumption group impacts ranked highest among the major impacts of construction activities on the environment in Ghana. The resource consumption group impacts were raw materials consumption, electricity consumption, water consumption and fuel consumption. Biodiversity impact was second followed by local issues impacts. The paper recommends that stakeholders in the construction industry should come up with special legislations, codes or standards relating to sustainable construction practices specific to Ghana's construction environment and ensure proper and effective implementation.

N/A, 2018

Construction activity is the indicator of development. Bangladesh is now considered as a developing country leaving the group of least developed countries. Dhaka is the capital of Bangladesh with less than 170 square kilometer of area holding more than 18 million of people in its metropolitan area. For the sake of gathering a huge population, with a lot of supports and services, buildings and supports are mandatory. For the incremental demand of commercial, industrial and academic importance, the city of the democratic country is now under huge pressure of structural improvement. But, naturally in all of the sectors, construction activities must have impacts on environment, human health and communication. The study is to investigate the main environmental pollution and risks of construction activities in Dhaka city. Specifically it is to delineate the impact of construction of MRT line-6 at Mirpur to Agargaon on human and environment and a set of way forward action for reducing pollution and risk of construction. From the qualitative and quantitative study it is found that, 97% respondent’s belief in the impact on the environment, 87% confirm about air pollution and 75 % of the respondents belief in noise pollution occurring due to construction. 75% respondents know that due to air pollution from construction site people suffers from respiratory problem. And 72% respondents agree that, due to noise pollution people suffer shearing problem, HBP and other problems. 84% respondent confirm that construction activity creates communication problem in Dhaka city. 75% respondents answer that traffic jam increases for construction activity in Dhaka. 91% respondent of survey, participant of FGD and KII participants believe that if construction authority aware about this pollution and maintain proper rules, law, safety and security it is possible to mitigate those pollution from construction activity or site. So always we need to follow construction work as per RAJUK approved plan and BNBC rules and regulations.

Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 2000

This paper presents a systematic approach to environmental management of pollution and/or hazards caused by urban construction projects in China. It proposes a qualitative approach to assess and control the problem and a method to calculate the Construction Pollution Index (CPI) which provides a quantitative measurement of pollution and/or hazards caused by the urban construction projects. Based on the analysis and discussions, the paper further proposes that major construction companies in China should obtain ISO 14001 Environmental Management System (EMS) certifications. By doing so, the construction companies can integrate the concept of environmental management into their construction management practice.

Building and Environment, 2009

This paper introduces a systematic approach for dealing with potential adverse environmental impacts at the pre-construction stage. The proposed methodology serves as an assessment tool for construction projects to measure the environmental performance of their construction activities. It also provides a consistent basis for comparisons and for future eco-labelling and environmental benchmarking among construction companies and construction sites. Within the methodological framework, nine categories of environmental aspects are proposed: atmospheric emissions; water emissions; waste generation; soil alteration; resource consumption; local issues; transport issues; effects on biodiversity; and incidents, accidents and potential emergency situations. The methodology includes 20 performance indicators developed with the help of a panel of experts. In order to avoid a typical shortcoming in environmental assessments methods, these environmental indicators, both direct and indirect, are always based on quantitative data available in the project documents. Significance limits for environmental aspects are also developed based on a statistical analysis of 55 new-start construction projects. Four case studies are provided to illustrate the practical use of the proposed methodology.