Assessment of the Oxidative Potential and Oxidative Burden from Occupational Exposures to Particulate Matter

Oxidative potential (OP) is a toxicologically relevant metric that integrates features like mass concentration and chemical composition of particulate matter (PM). Although it has been extensively explored as a metric for the characterization of environmental particles, this is still an underexplored application in the occupational field. This study aimed to estimate the OP of particles in two occupational settings from a construction trades school. This characterization also includes the comparison between activities, sampling strategies, and size fractions. Particulate mass concentrations (PM4-Personal, PM4-Area, and PM2.5-Area) and number concentrations were measured during three weeks of welding and construction/bricklaying activities. The OP was assessed by the ascorbate assay (OPAA) using a synthetic respiratory tract lining fluid (RTLF), while the oxidative burden (OBAA) was determined by multiplying the OPAA values with PM concentrations. Median (25th–75th percentiles) of PM mass and number concentrations were 900 (672–1730) µg m–3 and 128 000 (78 000–169 000) particles cm–3 for welding, and 432 (345–530) µg m–3 and 2800 (1700–4400) particles cm–3 for construction. Welding particles, especially from the first week of activities, were also associated with higher redox activity (OPAA: 3.3 (2.3–4.6) ρmol min–1 µg–1; OBAA: 1750 (893–4560) ρmol min–1 m–3) compared to the construction site (OPAA: 1.4 (1.0–1.8) ρmol min–1 µg–1; OBAA: 486 (341–695) ρmol min–1 m–3). The OPAA was independent of the sampling strategy or size fraction. However, driven by the higher PM concentrations, the OBAA from personal samples was higher compared to area samples in the welding shop, suggesting an influence of the sampling strategy on PM concentrations and OBAA. These results demonstrate that important levels of OPAA can be found in occupational settings, especially during welding activities. Furthermore, the OBAA found in both workplaces largely exceeded the levels found in environmental studies. Therefore, measures of OP and OB could be further explored as metrics for exposure assessment to occupational PM, as well as for associations with cardiorespiratory outcomes in future occupational epidemiological studies.

An evaluation of offsite construction skill profiles

Purpose This paper aims to evaluate the existing and emerging Offsite Construction (OSC) skills. Construction industry is inherently labour oriented, fashioning poor labour productivity, low sustainability, slow and costly processes. These shortcomings promote OSC alongside driving forces such as industrialisation, automation and digitalisation. However, the traditional construction skills are not on par with the complexity, where robots, co-bots and digital-driven automated systems create the need for novel OSC skills. Design/methodology/approach Data collection is executed through a Roundtable activity hosting Construction Management academics form Australian universities specialising in construction technology. They engaged in ranking of skills along with creating a word cloud for the question, “what are the future construction skills that will be more beneficial in an OSC platform?” Word cloud is reviewed in a discussion approach while skills ranking data is analysed using descriptive statistics. Findings The most prominent OSC skills are logistics manager, project manager and digital producer. Attributes of skills that come under construction trades workers, design, engineering and specialist professionals will vary based on onsite-offsite percentage combination in a construction project. Study reviews the required construction skills at two ends of a continuum featuring the trade-based skills; bricklayer, concreter and carpenter at one end (traditional build) and the heavily digitalised and automated skills at the other end (OSC). The noticeable transition towards OSC urges industry practitioners, policy-makers and education providers to focus on understanding and cultivating key OSC skills. Originality/value This study describes the transition of skills from onsite to OSC. It is presented as one of the earliest attempts to evaluate OSC skill profiles.

Scientific and educational cluster as a center of public and private management of construction trades

The author's definition of applied qualifications is given. It is aimed at the formation of applied qualifications based on resource centers of secondary vocational education institutions that are part of the construction research and education cluster. The principles of organizational and pedagogical conditions of the relations of the resource center with enterprises within the context of public and private administration are identified. The results of the survey among students on the issue of whether they want to learn applied qualifications are given. The organizational and pedagogical conditions of the innovative development of the educational cluster are formulated.

Noise Exposure Monitoring on the Segmental Box Girder Casting Process from a Concrete Casting Yard

Noise exposure monitoring is essential to assess noise exposure circumstances and provide a noise control plan to minimize noise exposure problems in the workplace. In Malaysia, occupational noise exposure problems have been increasing, especially in the construction industry. Hence, this study aims to investigate the noise exposure problem in a construction casting yard in Malaysia. The objectives of the study were to measure the current occupational noise exposure problem and to propose a noise control action. Field measurement was carried out at a segmented box girder casting yard under the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) construction project in Selangor, Malaysia. A total of six case studies from four different construction trades had been conducted. This study plotted noise maps and measured personal noise exposure levels for the three construction trades. The results showed that the equivalent sound level exceeded the action level of 85 dBA for these trades. Besides, the bar cutting trade with an 8-hour time-weighted average of 92.3 dBA exceeded the permissible exposure limit of 90 dBA. The noise reduction rating of the hearing protection device was evaluated, and appropriate noise control action was proposed. The proposed noise reduction rating was 32 dBA, so it is expected to reduce the time-weighted average sound level below 80 dBA for this workplace. In conclusion, the results could disseminate to construction workers to raise their risk awareness regarding the noise exposure issue in the workplace. The noise mapping information could also be used for the design of the engineering control to reduce the noise exposure level in the construction workplace.

QUANTIFYING THE IMPACT OF CONGESTION ON CONSTRUCTION LABOR PRODUCTIVITY USING AGENT-BASED MODELING

Several findings from the construction field stipulate that productivity falloffs are primarily management-related; however, this notion does not consider the direct impact of these same management decisions on the workers themselves. For instance, the planning of the workspace layout delves in a spatial configuration which if not properly managed can potentially result in congestion that, in turn, directly affects labor productivity. Previous research efforts developed models to analyze the effect of congestion on labor productivity but failed to capture all the complexities of this mechanism and its dynamics. Therefore, this paper puts forward the groundwork of an agent-based simulation model (ABM) and presents work targeted at quantifying the impact of congestion on the productivity of construction crews. More specifically, the ABM model takes into account two construction trades working in the same area and tackles five scenarios each depicting different congestion and interaction levels. At the heart of this simulation is a quantitative model that defines essential congestion metrics and outputs space interference values. Experiments were conducted and results highlighted that the higher the space interference values the less productive the crews become. Additionally, these values will constitute an integral part in future work when studying the impact of congestion on the crews' learning curve, whereby the latter being a major gauge for levels of productivity.