How Can You Minimizing Wastage in Construction?

Wastage in Construction

Here Civil Experience provides personal Experience related to construction waste such as what are the Types of Waste in construction so you can minimize them easily and save your project cost.

This article helpfull for everyone who is related to the civil engineering field or not because all of you will build your own house this information helps a lots.

Aakash Dudhat

We also explain powerful 5S methods to avoid Wastage in Construction at last but before reading the whole article which improves understanding.

Before going into deep you need to know Why materials are wasted during the building construction procedure so that you can better understand How to reduce material wastage in the builder’s line or during the construction of your dream house.

If you have to look at all the things during the work so that your money is not wasted due to material wastage in building construction.

If you read this article carefully I promise you save lots of money. Otherwise, incomplete knowledge does not give you the best result in avoiding wastage in construction or reducing material waste in construction

What are the 7 Types of Construction Waste?

Major important key points about construction waste will be fully explained by Aakash Dudhat in today’s civil experience article if everyone’s response will be good to know more related waste of construction materials.

We also create fully utilize and premium Civil Excel Spreadsheet which makes sure the material used is optimum. Check it out Click Here => Civil Experience Excel Sheet

How Can You Minimizing Wastage In Construction?
How Can You Minimize Wastage in Construction

#1 Wastage in construction due to Rework or Defect

If some part of a building project is not done correctly as per structural design or architectural plan the first time then that part has to be destroyed and rebuilt which triggers concrete wastage in the construction project.

If you give your building construction work to any new building contractor or someone who has never done civil engineering construction work, then there is a possibility of a lot of common mistakes in construction and also wastage in the construction.

#2 Over Processing due to lack of Experience

If you hire someone who is fresher then he/she charges may be less but Unnecessary steps in operations, such as reprocessing, double-handling, and double-checking add no value to working but your time must be increased which leads to delays in project completion.

The time required to do each work is limited. At the same time within the time limit, we have to do all the construction work well so time wastage in construction is eliminated. Otherwise Indirectly cost effect.

#3 Over Production of Materials

Producing excessive construction materials like concrete, buying more steel before need, faster than needed, or before it is needed.

Excessive material production is also not good for construction materials management to maintain the cost economical criteria of construction site work.

#4 Movement of Materials

As we talk about in point number 3 if you buy extra materials before need then it leads to moving/transporting to another point of the site which takes time, manpower, and equipment if needed.

That all manpower, equipment, and time directly increase the cost of the total project.

To move and not add value is called motion.

#5 Waiting or Delay in construction activity

Inactivity occurs because a preceding activity didn’t finish on time so alternatively time wastage in construction which is not allowable.

#6 Transportation

The unnecessary movement of materials is similar to point number 4 but little difference.

Whenever a material is brought, then where to place it is also a matter of importance but some people do not give importance to this matter and they invite waste of manpower in construction and time wastage in construction.

There are so many types of waste in construction but remember again I note some points only to focus on material wastage in construction.

Which is in different forms such as steel wastage in construction, cement wastage in construction, concrete wastage in construction, etc.

#7 Inventory

Excess or shortage.

And last but not least: Value vs Waste.

Value -the client cares that it is being done.

Waste -not valuable to the client.

Waste Results in Under Utilisation of Resources.

5S Method for Construction Waste Management

It’s not an official method but Civil Experience gives the name and follows it in my construction activity.

Another way to manage waste is to use the 5S method – which is an organizational approach to work.

It is short for Sorting, Simplifying, Sweeping, Standardising & Sustaining.

  • Sorting
  • Simplifying
  • Sweeping
  • Standardising
  • Sustaining

5S is not a one-time job

Important of 5S Method

Encouragement and self-discipline are needed.

5S can help us distinguish between “busy” and “active“.

5S can help identify and eliminate waste

How Can You Minimize wastage in construction?

Here I write lots of factors which generally be the reason for material wastage in the construction industry so you can avoid wastage in construction material by improving those factors

  1. Due to rebuilding the column/beam/slab due to honeycomb in concrete. You can use a proper vibrator during the casting of concrete done in a full concrete compaction state so that concrete wastage in construction Will not be done, make sure your cement slurry keep in formwork so cement wastage in construction is eliminated also concrete segregation does not produce.
    Guide: How to Use Construction Vibrator
  2. Every step of work is only followed after particular work is finished so if you miss this workflow, you have to do demolition them. You can avoid this issue by creating a workflow plan of the construction process which contains the time and When to do it.
  3. Cut down the floor due to varying degrees of the level slab, beam, or column which triggers wastage control in construction.
  4. Forget to provide dowels bar insertion in reinforcement for beam etc. If a portion of the building is not made of concrete, it will be a waste of time and if construction has been done, then over time the material, manpower, and money will also be a waste in construction.
  5. Shifting scrap on site of construction many times before disposing of it due to lack of management ability.
  6. Delay in information flow between structural design engineer, site engineer, and consultant officer if any due to communication gap.
  7. Errors or omissions in drawings.
  8. Differences between drawing & specifications.
  9. Delays in finalizing vendors/purchases.
  10. Delays in approval of materials/goods or store drawings.
  11. Wasted too much time searching material, locating and sorting stirrups, or scaffolding/ shuttering parts.
  12. An unsuccessful search of items or equipment resulted in wasted administration time, idle staff, and disruption of daily routines.
  13. Purchased awaiting items at a retail store due to limited space on the site.
  14. Shipping, transport, landing, and storage on-site are done without proper knowledge of the sequence of construction work.
  15. Poor handling of materials such as unloading near the gate moves closer to the site than to the work location.
  16. Getting more staff in one place where no one can work well.
  17. Poor calculation of CPM and PERF.
  18. Project Manager spends 50% of the time arranging contractors/ work OR Site engineer spends 50% of his time on follow-up with workers OR the manager/ engineer spends 40% of the time on procurement follow-up.

These are not exactly all mistakes that normally happen at the site of construction work but I try to cover the most common forms of inefficiencies in projects

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Author Aakash Dudhat

It is my pleasure to welcome you to civilexperiences.com, a website created and managed by Dudhat Aakash. In addition to having a Bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering

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