Exploring the challenges impeding construction process carbon reduction in the UK

Figures & data

Table 1. Carbon reduction barriers.

Code	Barriers	References
		Mohd-Rahim et al. (2017)	Ng (2015)	Wong et al. (2015)	Salama and Hana (2010)	Tierney and Tennant (2015)
BR1	Lack of support from top management	x	–	–	–	–
BR2	Increase in construction project cost due to carbon reduction efforts	–	x	x	x	–
BR3	Lack of carbon reduction knowledge	–	x	–	–	–
BR4	Non-availability of low-carbon materials and equipment	–	x	–	–	–
BR5	Non-involvement during the design and specification stage of the project	–	x	–	–	–
BR6	Fear of jeopardizing project success in terms of time, cost and quality	–	x	–	–	–
BR7	Lack of incentives to mitigate the risk that might arise if carbon reduction strategies are implemented	–	x	–	–	–
BR8	Lack of demand for low-carbon construction project	–	–	–	–	x
BR9	Lack of collaboration between clients, their consultants and contractors	–	–	x	–	–
BR10	Lack of awareness of the benefit of reducing carbon	–	–	–	x	–
BR11	Difficulty in quantifying carbon reduction benefits	–	–	–	x	–
BR12	Lack of clear organizational carbon reduction policy^a	–	–	–	–	–
BR13	Lack of clear carbon reduction regulation by the government	–	–	–	x	–
BR14	The complexity of construction projects	–	–	–	x	–
BR15	Lack of awareness of carbon reduction technologies^a	–	–	–	–	–
BR16	Lack of a clear carbon management plan related to a construction project^a	–	–	–	–	–

^aBarriers were added from the pilot study.

Figure 1. Research framework for the study (source: adapted from Chan 2004).

Table 2. Demographic profile of respondents.

	Respondent features	Percentage (%)
Designation	Sustainability/carbon/environmental managers	54
	Project/cost/operations/design managers	46
Years of industry experience	Over 20 years	37
	Between 11 and 20 years	34
	Less than 10 years	29
Years of industry experience relating to carbon reduction	More than 5 years	37
	Up to 5 years	63
Organization type	Contracting	73
	Consulting	27

Table 3. Ranking of carbon reduction barriers.

Code	Mean	Standard Deviation (SD)	Rank	Shapiro-Wilk (p-value)	Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test (p-value)
BR1	4.39	0.737	1	0.000	0.000*
BR2	4.37	0.698	2	0.000	0.000*
BR9	4.37	0.733	3	0.000	0.000*
BR5	4.10	1.068	4	0.000	0.000*
BR13	3.93	1.292	5	0.000	0.000*
BR3	3.83	1.093	6	0.000	0.000*
BR4	3.78	1.061	7	0.000	0.000*
BR6	3.76	0.969	8	0.000	0.000*
BR10	3.76	1.157	9	0.000	0.001*
BR15	3.66	0.965	10	0.000	0.000*
BR7	3.66	1.063	11	0.000	0.001*
BR16	3.61	0.919	12	0.000	0.001*
BR12	3.41	1.204	13	0.001	0.000*
BR14	3.39	1.046	14	0.000	0.027*
BR11	3.37	1.090	15	0.003	0.042*
BR8	3.20	1.289	16	0.001	0.415
Cronbach’s Alpha	0.781

*p-value < 0.05.

Table 4. Factor analysis for the carbon reduction barriers.

		Factor Loading
Code	Carbon reduction barriers	1	2	3	4
Resources and Prioritization
RPB1	Lack of awareness of carbon reduction technologies	0.827
RPB2	Non-availability of low-carbon materials and equipment	0.819
RPB3	Lack of carbon reduction knowledge	0.702
RPB4	Lack of support from top management	0.570
RPB5	Non-involvement during the design and specification stage of the project	0.552
Policy and Standards
PSB1	Lack of clear organizational carbon reduction policy		0.875
PSB2	Lack of clear carbon reduction regulation by the government		0.829
PSB3	Lack of a clear carbon management plan related to a construction project		0.607
PSB4	Lack of collaboration between clients, their consultants and contractors		0.541
Risk and Commitment
RCB1	Fear of jeopardizing project success in terms of time, cost and quality			0.810
RCB2	Lack of incentives to mitigate the risk that might arise if carbon reduction strategies are implemented			0.742
RCB3	Increase in construction project cost due to carbon reduction efforts			0.692
Awareness and Complexity
ACB1	Lack of awareness of the benefit of reducing carbon				0.823
ACB2	The complexity of construction projects				−0.628
Eigenvalues		3.556	2.419	1.989	1.401
Variance (%)		25.397	17.282	14.205	10.007
Cumulative variance (%)		25.397	42.679	56.884	66.890

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