Greenbuild Expo 2010 - Verifying the environmental performance of offsite manufacturing

For the second year running Mtech Consult was invited to speak at this embryonic conference at Manchester Central. Last year's debut event was small but nevertheless very successful launch for this exhibition and conference. This year Manchester Central was full to capacity with a diverse range of exhibitors covering all aspects of the sustainability agenda together with an extended conference programme of conferences and workshops.

Last year we presented the challenges for the offsite sector in demonstrating its sustainability credentials and overcoming industry perceptions that factory production was not environmental friendly.

This year we were able to demonstrate that the research work we have undertaken over the past few years has now come to fruition and Mtech now has the modelling techniques and database information to verify that offsite manufacturing can provide substantial benefits in terms of reduced embodied energy and lower environmental impacts.

The presentation showed the results of life cycle analyses that we have undertaken on a number of offsite construction technologies and with comparisons carried out in a direct back-to-back basis we now have evidence to verify that modern offsite factories can deliver the following improvements compared with traditional masonry building:

• as a build methodology < 38% lower environmental impact (Ecopoints)
• overall reduction carbon emissions < 42% less kg/CO2 eq
• use of energy for building & maintenance > 21% improvement

The presentation concluded by confirming the importance that this research has for the wider construction sector with clear choices on how the industry can reduce its carbon footprint with confidence and clarity. These new modelling techniques can now be used for all novel construction product manufacturers to demonstrate that the construction industry can improve its overall environmental performance. This is an important step forward for the government's wider commitments to reduce the country's CO2 emissions.