Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529

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Journal of Cleaner Production

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jclepro

The relationship between heavy equipment cost efficiency and cleaner

production in construction
David G. Carmichael a, *, Xuesong Shen a, Vachara Peansupap b
a
School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, 2052, NSW, Australia
b
Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University, Pathumwan, Bangkok, Thailand

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Attitudes in the construction industry towards emissions and cleaner production are mixed. Many in the
Received 24 May 2018 industry do not measure their emissions, or show awareness or progress towards minimizing emissions,
Received in revised form but rather focus on more traditional matters of time, cost and production. Some writers suggest cost, or
6 September 2018
an industry perception of extra cost, as a main barrier to implementing more sustainable practices. There
Accepted 18 November 2018
Available online 23 November 2018
has been a slow shift to a sustainability mindset, but commonly this shift is only embarked upon if there
are parallel cost savings. A realistic business view is that sustainability in the construction industry will
only be achieved if parallel cost reductions occur. Within this debate, the paper puts forward the
Keywords:
Construction operations
proposition and shows that, for a defined type of construction operation, performing at minimum unit
Unit emissions cost (cost per production) also leads to minimizing unit emissions (emissions per production). The
Unit cost implication of this is that, within an existing operation, least unit emissions can be achieved without an
General coincidence increase in unit cost; alternatively, traditionally efficient ways of undertaking construction have the least
Optimum environmental impact. Conversely, not operating at minimum unit cost leads to unnecessary emissions.
The paper demonstrates this on an array of construction practices, and opines that similar results will
hold for related construction operations.
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction embraced reducing emissions, others are reluctant because of the

The construction industry has typically focused on cost, pro-
duction and time, and generally designs and manages construction
operations and activities in tune with a minimum unit cost (cost
per production) criterion (while satisfying any applicable safety
and environmental regulations). Considerations relating to emis-
sions and cleaner production have not been in the industry's con-
sciousness until recently (Montalvo, 2008; Chong et al., 2009). This
increasing emissions awareness is being driven by public sector
client organizations enlarging their tender selection criteria to
include environmental and social issues, the industry's recognition
that it is one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases primarily
resulting from its large use of diesel fuel, and the public call for
greater social and environmental responsibility to be demonstrated
by the industry in line with increasing public debates on the
potentially changing climate. While some contractors have
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: D.Carmichael@unsw.edu.au (D.G. Carmichael), x.shen@unsw.
edu.au (X. Shen), pvachara@chula.ac.th (V. Peansupap).
belief of the extra cost involved and the consequent reduction in
profit (Yip, 2000; Montalvo, 2008; Chong et al., 2009; Giesekam
et al., 2016).
However, this belief in having to trade-off reduced emissions
against extra cost may not be well-founded for many construction
operations. In particular, for existing construction operations and
activities of a defined type, this paper puts forward the proposition
that by designing and managing the operations at minimum unit
cost, then performance will also be according to minimum unit
emissions (emissions per production). That is, operating in tradi-
tionally cost- and production-efficient ways will be best for the
environment. Conversely, not operating efficiently will lead to un-
necessary emissions. As background to this paper, a large number of
practitioners were informally interviewed as to what they thought
would be the impact on unit cost of reducing unit emissions for
such operations, and no one was able state with any confidence
what this would be.
To investigate the paper's proposition, a number of typical
construction operations and activities are examined in detail and in
general. In general terms, operations which can be described as

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.11.167
0959-6526/© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
522 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529
Notation
C, S subscripts denoting customer and server
C owning and operating cost per unit time
CAP customer capacity (units of measurement
changeable with application)
K number of customers, if finite
N, I non-idling and idling emissions per unit time
1=m average service time
1=l average backcycle time of a customer; time
between customer arrivals
r servicing factor, l=m
h server utilization (proportion of time the server is
busy)
CO2
e carbon dioxide equivalent
cyclic, serial and parallel are developed, while in detail, operations
such as earthmoving (including quarrying and surface mining),
comprising an excavator (loader, shovel, …) and a fleet of trucks are
examined with respect to all the variables able to be influenced by
the engineer; the influenceable variables include excavator bucket
capacity, truck number and capacity, backcycle times, loading
discipline (single-sided, double-sided), and multiple load and
dump points. A theoretical argument is then developed for general
operations. Collectively, the paper addresses many common con-
struction operations and activities, although it is not possible to
examine every operation and activity. From these, the paper makes
inferences regarding its proposition.
For the modelling and analysis of construction operations and
activities, thinking akin to queuing theory (Carmichael, 1987) is
used because of its tractability, the greater insight it gives for well-
defined operations, and its potential for giving closed form solu-
tions. Simulation could also be used, but would lead only to nu-
merical results and conclusions based on these.
The paper is structured as follows. Firstly, the background is
reviewed, and the paper's proposition advanced. The ensuing
analysis looks at different construction operations and activities
starting with a single activity and progressing to various finite
source, cyclic, sequential and parallel activities. Examples are given
covering a range of construction operations. Nonlinear service
characteristics and constraints are included. A discussion and
conclusions follow.
The paper is written with respect to existing construction op-
erations and activities of a defined type, and minimizing their
emissions. Of course, additional to this, absolute emissions could be
further reduced by using newer technology, changing fuels or
driver training (Jukic and Carmichael, 2016), but this is not the
subject of this paper.
The paper puts forward original derivations and conclusions,
and will be of interest to not only those in the construction in-
dustry, but also those concerned with production generally.
2. Background
The background to the paper's approach is discussed in terms of
emissions and operational analysis.
2.1. Emissions
Production and costs of construction equipment have histori-
cally been the matters examined in most detail, and constitute the
bulk of the many texts in the discipline. More recently, emissions
related to construction equipment working (as opposed to carbon
emissions embodied in materials or a supply chain e Lee, 2011, or
industry emissions e Wang, 2016) has attracted interest, and this is
ongoing. This paper links all three e production, costs and emis-
sions e and fills a gap in this knowledge area.
Methods that have been proposed for establishing the emissions
of heavy construction equipment and information published on
construction emissions includes that by EPA (2008a,b) and CARB
(2018), Lewis (2009), DCCEE (2011), and DRET (2010). The
approach of EPA (2008b) uses engine tier, which is based on engine
age, and engine power rating, and along with CARB (2018) can be
used for overall operational analysis. The approaches of EPA
(2008a), DCCEE (2011) and DRET (2010), allow for conversion
from fuel use to emissions. Only the approach of Lewis (2009) (also
based on engine tier) allows operational or equipment cycle
component analysis, and hence is the most applicable to this pa-
per's analysis. The approach of Lewis has been adopted in Ahn et al.
(2009), Marshall (2010), and Carmichael et al. (2012, 2014a) in
earthmoving papers. Other studies based on measured field emis-
sions of heavy equipment include, for example, Frey et al. (2008),
Abolhasani et al. (2008), Frey and Kim (2009), Heydarian et al.
(2012) and Ahn et al. (2013). These papers provide insight to the
emission behaviour of heavy construction equipment, but cannot
be used directly in this paper's analysis.
The approach of Lewis (2009), based on extensive observations
of different site-instrumented construction equipment, uses engine
tier and engine power to establish idle and non-idle emissions. The
general analysis given below uses the distinction between idle and
non-idle emissions. For specific numerical examples below, specific
idle and non-idle emissions are calculated using the approach of
Lewis (2009), or if fuel use is available, using the fuel-emissions
conversions given in DCCEE (2011).
2.2. Operational analysis
The types of construction activities discussed in this paper lend
themselves most readily to analysis by discrete-event oriented
simulation (for example, Ahn et al., 2009) and queuing theory (for
example, Carmichael et al., 2014c). For equivalent assumptions,
both methods of analysis will give the same results. Generally,
discrete-event oriented simulation allows the modelling and
analysis of more complicated construction operations. However,
where queuing theory has applicability, it gives greater insight into
operation behaviour; queuing theory type thinking is adopted in
this paper for this reason.
3. Analysis
3.1. Outline
The paper adopts queuing theory terminology in that it refers to
entities as customers and servers, in order that the paper's results
may have wider applicability than construction alone. Each activity
is regarded as a service operation. Customers arrive to be serviced,
and depart having been serviced. For example, where an excavator
loads trucks, the trucks are the customers and the excavator is the
server, and the loading of the trucks constitutes servicing of the
trucks. For concrete trucks discharging into a site concrete hopper/
pump, the trucks are again the customers, the concrete hopper/
pump is the server and servicing constitutes the unloading of the
trucks. Where vehicle movements are involved for customers,
vehicle manoeuvre time at the server is included as part of the
service time in order that queuing theory assumptions hold.
Arrivals of customers and servicings are allowed to contain
uncertainty, that is they are non-deterministic. The general results
 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529
derived below hold irrespective of any probability distributions
describing the servicings and arrivals. Numerical examples given
below, however, may use particular distributions. Queues of cus-
tomers at servers are drawn in the figures in this paper, and result
from this non-deterministic nature; however for any given
customer servicing, a queue may or may not exist dependent on
previous customer servicings.
Defined types of construction operations or activities in this
paper are those where both the customers and the servers generate
emissions, for example through the burning of diesel fuel or use of
energy or electric power. Both servers and customers may have idle
and non-idle periods during their total operating time, and
respectively generate different amounts of emissions during these
periods (Lewis, 2009). The paper distinguishes itself from other
construction-related practices such as inventory management
(Marklund and Berling, 2016), and other presentations of
Cost/servicing ¼ (Server idle time þ Servicing time)CS þ(Customer wait time þ Servicing time)CC
emissions-cost information such as marginal abatement cost
curves (MACC) (Carmichael et al., 2014b).
Different operation configurations are outlined and theoretical
proofs of the paper's proposition are given; these are supported
with numerical examples.
3.2. Proposition
The paper puts forward the following proposition for the above-
Emissions/servicing ¼ {(Server idle time) IS þ (Servicing time) NS } þ{(Customer wait time) IC þ (Servicing time) IC }
defined construction operations or activities: Within an existing
operation or activity, and with respect to choice of customer number,
or equivalent controlling or influenceable variable, minimum unit cost
coincides with minimum unit emissions. The implication of this is
that, within an existing operation, least unit emissions can be
achieved without an increase in unit cost; alternatively, tradition-
ally efficient ways of undertaking construction have the least
environmental impact. Conversely, not operating at minimum unit
cost leads to unnecessary emissions. If true, then industry concerns
about extra cost associated with moving towards more sustainable
practices will be allayed.
The general method adopted for each case in the following is to
derive expressions for emissions, cost and production. From these,
two objective functions e broadly one of unit emissions (that is,
Fig. 1. Single construction activity.
523
emissions per production), and one of unit costs (that is, cost per
production) e are established. These two objective functions are
then examined for commonality with respect a relevant influ-
enceable variable such as truck fleet size or truck arrival rate.
The following development goes from the most elementary
construction operation or activity to progressively more compli-
cated operations. Construction operations typically involve multi-
ple activities, where each activity follows another (sequential
activities), or each activity can be done at the same time as another
(parallel activities), or activities are done cyclically.
3.3. The simplest case
Consider firstly, a single activity (Fig. 1) as a building block for
more involved construction operations.
The cost per servicing can be viewed as,
where the subscripts S and C denote the server and customers,
respectively. CS and CC are total owning and operating costs per
unit time of a server and a customer, respectively. In any given
servicing, only the server idle time or the customer waiting time
will exist, and not both.
Emissions are categorized as corresponding to the server or the
customer being idle or non-idle (Lewis, 2009). For I denoting idle
and N denoting non-idle,
Let the arrival rate to the server of customers be l (customers
per time), and the service rate be m (customers per time). 1=l be-
comes the inter-arrival time of the customers and 1=m the service
time. Infinite source queuing thinking applies. Two possibilities
exist:
(i) l < m. This is a conventional assumption, in order that
customer queues do not grow without bound, irrespective of
the distributions describing arrivals and servicings. The total
averaged cost over a unit of time of 1=l is,
1
Cost ¼ ðCS þ CC Þ
l
while total averaged emissions over the same unit of time are
given by,
 
1 1 1 1
Emissions ¼ IS
þ NS þ IC
l m m l
The production is the capacity, CAP, of one customer. The units of
measurement of capacity will change with different activities.
Production ¼ CAP
524 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529

This gives, demonstrate the behaviour as described by the above expressions.

Consider trucks arriving to discharge concrete into a concrete
ðCS þ CC Þ pump's hopper. The observed average discharging time was 1=m
Cost=production ¼ (1a)
lCAP ¼ 16.93 min; the inter-arrival time between trucks was 1=l
  ¼ 51.63 min, giving a servicing factor, r ¼ l=m of 0.33, with a truck
IS 1l
m1 þ NS 1m þ IC 1l capacity of 8 m3 . The hourly owning and operating costs of a truck
Emissions=production ¼ (1b) and the concrete pump were $62/h and $146/h respectively. Based
CAP
on site observations, together with the conversions of DCCEE
(2011), emissions were calculated as: IS ¼ 7.32 kg/h, NS
(ii) l  m. For such a case, conventional queuing thinking will not ¼ 32.49 kg/h, IC ¼ 6.18 kg/h, and NC ¼ 30.48 kg/h. Fig. 2 shows the
apply. Both the cost per production and emissions per pro- change in unit costs ($=m3 ) and unit emissions (CO2 -e/m3 ) as l
duction increase as l grows. For demonstration purposes, changes for the above analysis. CO2 -e is carbon dioxide equivalent.
consider the case applying over one servicing. Firstly, let the Fig. 2 demonstrates numerically the coincidence of the unit costs
service time, 1=m ¼ 1=l. Then, the total averaged cost per and unit emissions plots with respect to customer arrival rate.
production and averaged emissions per production over a
unit of time of 1=m are respectively, 3.4. Finite source construction operations

CS þ CC CS þ CC The simplest case just covered can be extended in a number of

Cost=production ¼ ¼ (2a)
mCAP lCAP ways. Fig. 3 shows an operation where customers get serviced, but
eventually return to be serviced again. And this process continues
NS m1 þ IC m1 NS þ IC over time. The implication is that the number of customers is finite,
Emissions=production ¼ ¼ (2b) that is a finite source of customers. Finite source queuing theory
CAP lCAP
thinking applies. Earthmoving, quarrying and surface mining op-
These give the same results as Equations (1a) and (1b) if 1=m ¼ erations follow such a process, where typically a fleet of trucks cycle
1=l. Now consider 1=m ¼ 2=l. Then, repeatedly between loading (servicing) and travel and dump,
eventually returning to take subsequent loads.
CS þ 1:5CC 2CS þ 3CC
Cost=production ¼ ¼ (3a) For a finite number of customers, K,
mCAP lCAP
Cost=time ¼ CS þ KCC
NS m1 þ 1:5IC m1 2NS þ 3IC
Emissions=production ¼ ¼ (3b) Emissions=time ¼ NS h þ IS ð1
hÞ þ NC ðmh=K lÞK
CAP lCAP
The numerators in Equations (3a) and (3b) increase with ana- þ IC ð1
mh=K lÞK
lyses done over longer time periods.
Production=time ¼ mhCAP
3.3.1. Proof of optima coincidence Here, h is the server utilization, that is the proportion of time
The derivatives with respect to l of Equations (1a) and (1b) are that the server is busy, and 1=l is the average time a customer takes
negative, implying functions which decrease as l increases, with a between finishing service and arriving back in queue (backcycle
minimum value at l ¼ m. Subtracting Equation (2a) from (3a), and time). h can be obtained from any queuing analysis, simulation or
Equation (2b) from (3b) respectively gives positive numbers, site observations. For emissions calculation purposes, the times
implying functions which increase as l increases, with a minimum associated with customers and the server are broken into idling and
value at l ¼ m. That is, both the cost per production and emissions non-idling components, as earlier. For customers, the backcycle
per production have minima at the same value of l, namely l ¼ m. time and service time are regarded as non-idle time and idle time
The optima for unit cost and unit emissions are coincident. respectively.
The result holds true for differing values of all the underlying That is,
variables. The argument remains unchanged for multiple servers.
CS þ KCC
Cost=production ¼ (4a)
3.3.2. Example mhCAP
A site concrete discharging example using numerical values can

Fig. 2. Single activity e concrete supply; unit emissions (solid plot) and unit cost
(dashed plot). Fig. 3. Cyclic construction operation.
 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529 525

NS h þ IS ð1
hÞ þ NC ðmh=K lÞK þ IC ð1
mh=K lÞK

Emissions=production ¼ (4b)
mhCAP

3.4.1. Proof of optima coincidence
The coincidence of the optima of Equations (4a) and (4b) with
respect to customer number, K, can be demonstrated by assuming
that the plot of h versus K follows a piecewise linear form. The
linearization can be done as finely as desired, or coarsely in two
linear parts. Generally, h increases nearly linearly for small K, while
for larger K, this transitions into hz1; the intersection of these two
regimes (in the deterministic case) gives what is called a balanced
or matched value of K ¼ Km , and equals 1 þ m=l. The same Proof
applies irrespective of the fineness of the linearization of the h -K
plot, but is more simply presented for linearization involving two
regimes, with a transition at K ¼ Km .
For K < Km, server utilization is given by,
Similarly, from Equation (6b), the emissions/production expression
IC
has a positive slope of mCAP . That is, the cost/production function
increases with K.
Based on this examination of the function slopes either side of
Km , the optima for both cost/production and emissions/production
with respect to K occur at Km , subject to any integer requirements
on K.
The same argument may be extended to a more detailed
piecewise linearization of the h
K plot, where coincident optima
for the minimum unit cost and minimum unit emissions cases can
also be demonstrated. The argument remains unchanged for mul-
tiple servers.

K=m 3.4.2. Example

h¼ ¼ K=Km An earthmoving operation (Fig. 4) is used here to demonstrate
1=m þ 1=l
the above result. Service involves the manoeuvre and loading of the
Substituting in Equations (4a) and (4b), trucks by an excavator or equivalent. On being loaded, trucks then
progress through loaded haul, dumping and empty return haul,
CS þ KCC which are collectively referred to as the backcycle, followed by any
Cost=production ¼ (5a)
mðK=Km ÞCAP possible queuing at the load point. 1=l becomes the average
backcycle time. Finite source queuing results (Carmichael, 1989)
NS
IS þ NC =r
IC =r IS þ KIC can be used to obtain h.
Emissions=production ¼ þ Data collected from one operation gave truck characteristics of:
mCAP mðK=Km ÞCAP
1450 HP engine power, engine tier 1, idling fuel use 18 L/h, non-
(5b) idling fuel use 130 L/h, and observed average load of 78 m3. Exca-
Differentiating Equation (5a) with respect to K, the slope of the vator characteristics were: 1086 HP engine power, engine tier 2,
cost/production expression is m
C S Km
K 2 CAP
which is negative for all K. idling fuel use 20 L/h, and non-idling fuel use 62 L/h. The hourly
Similarly, from Equation (5b), the emissions/production expression owning and operating cost of a truck was $274/h, while that of the
has a negative slope of m
I S Km
K 2 CAP
. That is, both the cost/production excavator was $487/h. The observed average truck service time was
function and the emissions/production function decrease with K. 3 min 31 s, and the observed average backcycle time was 6 min 0 s.
For K > Km Using Lewis (2009), idling and non-idling emissions can be estab-
lished. Also, using the DCCEE (2011) method, emissions can be
CS þ KCC calculated by multiplying fuel use, energy content and emission
Cost=production ¼ (6a)
mCAP factor, where the last two are published DCCEE values.
Figs. 5e8 are based on this data. Fig. 5 shows how unit emissions
and unit costs vary with truck fleet size, K. Figs. 6 and 7 show the
NS
IS þ NC =r
IC =r IS þ KIC
Emissions=production ¼ þ impact of doubling the truck backcycle time, and truck loading
mCAP mCAP time, respectively. Fig. 8 looks at using biofuel as an alternative to
(6b) diesel.
These numerical studies confirm the earlier theoretical result.
Differentiating Equation (6a) with respect to K, the slope of the
CC
cost/production expression is mCAP which is positive for all K.

Fig. 5. Excavator-truck operation, influence of truck number on unit emissions (solid

Fig. 4. Schematic of earthmoving operation. plot) and unit cost (dashed plot).
526 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529
Fig. 6. Excavator-truck operation, doubling of the truck backcycle time, unit emissions
(solid plot) and unit cost (dashed plot).
Fig. 7. Excavator-truck operation, doubling the truck loading time, unit emissions
(solid plot) and unit cost (dashed plot).
Fig. 8. Excavator-truck operation, 15% lower fuel use, unit emissions (solid plot) and
unit cost (dashed plot).
Fig. 9. Sequential activities.
The result is also seen to apply for different truck loadings and
service mechanisms, for example single- or double-sided loading.
That is, numerical studies confirm the coincidence result for any
typical industry values for the underlying variables of excavator
bucket capacity, truck number, truck capacity/size, payload type,
fuel use, travel times, backcycle times, loading times, and loading
policy/discipline (single-sided, double-sided) (Carmichael and
Mustaffa, 2018).
The inference from this is that for existing earthmoving opera-
tions, least unit emissions are achievable at no extra cost. Tradi-
tional earthmoving operations designed and managed efficiently
have the least impact on the environment. Conversely, not config-
uring earthmoving operations to run efficiently leads to unnec-
essary emissions.
Consider now, combining single activities in different ways.
3.5. Sequential and parallel activities
Consider activities that follow each other sequentially (Fig. 9).
The activities need not be the same.
The output from one activity becomes the input to the next
activity. Customers proceed from one activity to another, where
servicings take place at each activity (Carmichael, 1987). Examples
of construction operations that are sequential or serial include
component fabrication passing through phases, or the 'inverse' of
this where sequences of equipment come into contact with an
object. Manufacturing and assembly line operations involve mul-
tiple work stations. In the erection of prefabricated housing, the
workplace remains stationary and is serviced in turn by different
trades. Precast concrete manufacture, and the stages involved in
mining, pipelaying and road making are other examples.
Where there are no restrictions on queues between activities,
each activity may be analyzed as a single activity in isolation from
the others (Carmichael, 1987), in which case the paper's earlier
result holds.
For activities being carried out at the same time, namely parallel
or concurrent activities (Fig. 10), but without a common queue, the
same result holds (Carmichael, 1987). The parallel activities need
not be the same. For parallel or concurrent activities with a com-
mon queue, this is the multiple server case referred to in Section
3.3, and that result applies.
3.6. Cyclic activities
With cyclic activities, the customer never leaves, progressing
from one activity to the next, eventually returning to the first ac-
tivity, followed by continually repeating the cycle. Examples
include earthmoving, quarrying, and surface and below-ground
mining operations involving repeated load, loaded haul, dump,
and empty return activities. Haul roads may be divided into sec-
tions, with each section regarded as a server. Or servers can be
combined. Generally, haul roads are regarded as self-service
servers. Asphalt paving is a further example. Or the thinking can
be 'inverted' whereby, for example, a mine face cycles through the
various machines/activities used at the face e blasting, loading,
cutting, drilling, bolting.
The results presented for finite source queues above generally
would apply for cyclic queues because of the ability to convert
readily from cyclic operations to finite source operations.
Fig. 10. Parallel activities.
 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529 527

3.7. Nonlinear characteristics

The earlier derived expressions for unit costs and unit emissions
assume linear characteristics for cost and emissions. That is, the
cost is assumed to increase at a constant rate with time e the
greater the time, the greater the cost; the cost per time of equip-
ment is assumed to be constant. Similarly, the emissions, both
idling and non-idling, are assumed to increase at a constant rate
with time e the greater the time spent idling (or non-idling), the
greater the idling (or non-idling) emissions; emissions per time are
assumed constant. However, there may be circumstances where
the cost-time and emissions-time relationships are not linear.
For example, with scrapers in earthmoving, the load growth
curve is nonlinear, with the rate of fuel usage and rate of emissions
increasing per increment in load. With earth going into the scraper Fig. 12. Dozer-scraper operation, load time 0.7 min, unit emissions (solid plot) and unit
cost (dashed plot).
bowl working against itself as the bowl becomes progressively
fuller, the fuel use and hence emissions increase as the load in the
scraper's bowl increases. The fuel use versus loading time is
concave upwards, that is, its slope is increasing with load time.
However from an examination of the above expressions for unit
cost and unit emissions (Equations (4a) and (4b)), for any given
(fixed) service time per customer, the above results of Section 3.4
do not change.

3.7.1. Example
A dozer-scraper earthmoving operation is used here as an
example containing nonlinear characteristics. Service involves
push-loading of scrapers by a dozer. After loading, scrapers then
progress through cycle components similar to the earlier truck
example, Fig. 4. The notation of this earlier example carries over.
Given all the components of a scraper's cycle and their rela- Fig. 13. Dozer-scraper operation, load time 0.9 min, unit emissions (solid plot) and unit
tionship to cost and fuel use, increasing scraper load time leads to a cost (dashed plot).
percentage increase in cost which is lower than the percentage
increase in fuel (and hence emissions). This leads to scraper opti-
mum load times based on unit cost being greater than those based
on unit emissions. However, this result does not impact the opti-
mum fleet size with respect to unit cost or unit emissions where the
load time is fixed rather than variable.
Data collected from one operation gave scraper characteristics
of: 16 m3 bowl capacity, 460 HP engine power, and average (all
activities) fuel use 55 L/h. Dozer characteristics were: 420 HP en-
gine power, and average (all activities) fuel use 50 L/h. The total
hourly owning and operating costs of a scraper and dozer were
$250 and $245, respectively. Average loading time was 0.5 min. Idle
and non-idle times are based on site-observed values. Using the
DCCEE (2011) method, emissions are calculated by multiplying fuel
use, energy content and emission factor, where the last two are

Fig. 14. Equality part of the time-production constraint line shown dotted. Customer
numbers left of this are inadmissible.

published DCCEE values.

For a constant backcycle time of 7.3 min, Figs. 11e13 show the
relationship between unit cost and unit emissions for different load
times. A load growth curve of the form: cumulative load
(m3 ) ¼
11.26 x2 þ 28.72x þ 0.61, where x is load time, is used
based on site observations.

3.8. Constraints

All the above results refer to unconstrained cases. The minima of

Fig. 11. Dozer-scraper operation, load time 0.5 min, unit emissions (solid plot) and unit the unit emissions and unit cost plots are the same. However, this
cost (dashed plot). result extends to certain constrained minima cases also.
528 D.G. Carmichael et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 211 (2019) 521e529
3.8.1. Example
Consider a time-production constraint, that is a limitation
requiring a defined production within a defined timeframe. Also,
consider the operation in Fig. 4. There,
Production=time ¼ mhCAP
where 1=m ¼ 3 min 31 s, and CAP ¼ 78 m3 . For a required produc-
tion of at least 10000 m3 over an 11 h period, then h  0:68 at r ¼
0:586, or equivalently K  2. That is, at least 2 trucks are required to
satisfy this time-production constraint. The equality part of the
constraint is shown in Fig. 14 as a dotted vertical line. Customer
numbers less than 2 are inadmissible. For the case drawn, the un-
constrained optimum number of customers is the same as the
constrained optimum number of customers. However for greater
production requirements, the vertical constraint line will move to
the right whereby the constrained optimum number of customers
will be greater than the unconstrained optimum number of cus-
tomers, but still the result that the minimum for unit emissions is
the same as the minimum of the unit costs will remain.
4. Conclusion
For defined construction operations or activities, the paper's
proposition is: Within an existing operation or activity, and with
respect to choice of customer number, or equivalent controlling or
influenceable variable, minimum unit cost coincides with minimum
unit emissions. This proposition was demonstrated to be true both
theoretically and in numerical studies over a range of operations
and activities.
For an isolated piece of equipment, as equipment activity in-
creases, then so could production and fuel use, and hence cost and
emissions, be anticipated to increase. Production, cost and emis-
sions will all trend similarly. That is, least (or greatest) unit cost will
coincide with least (or greatest) unit emissions. However, with
interacting, interdependent or interfering equipment such as an
excavator and a dependent fleet of trucks, this direct production-
cost-emissions relationship relative to an influenceable variable
(for example, truck fleet size) breaks down, and the unit costs and
unit emissions in general become nonlinear and dependent on the
value of the influenceable variable.
In terms of implications for cleaner production/sustainability, it
can be concluded that for existing operations or activities, where
both the server equipment and customer equipment consume en-
ergy and produce emissions, minimum unit emissions can be ob-
tained by carrying out work according traditional minimum unit
cost thinking. The full paper's findings are firstly that operating in
traditionally cost-efficient ways leads to least emissions, secondly
operating sustainably (within the confines of existing operations)
does not involve extra cost, and thirdly that not operating cost
efficiently leads to unnecessary emissions. The paper's result, if
practised, should lead to increased levels of cleaner production and
sustainability in the construction industry.
The result is independent of any carbon cost as determined by
carbon markets.
A large array of construction operations were used as example
demonstrations of the paper's result. This result applies to the
design and management of existing operations, using available
equipment, irrespective of the equipment particulars. Absolute
emissions could be further reduced through the use of newer
equipment, engine modifications, vehicle emission devices, alter-
native fuels or driver training; all such initiatives however do not
change the paper's general conclusion.
The models adopted in the paper assumed that the construction
activities involved the use of energy or fuel in both the 'customer'
and the 'server', where such terms could be interpreted specifically
in different cases, for example customers may be trucks and a
server may be an excavator loading trucks. The use of energy and
fuel generates emissions.
In the Introduction it was mentioned that an impetus for this
paper was industry's lack of knowledge on the relationship be-
tween unit cost and unit emissions. There it was stated that a large
number of practitioners were informally interviewed as to what
they thought would be the impact on unit cost of reducing unit
emissions for such operations, and no one was able state with any
confidence what this would be. However, and interestingly, when
the same group of practitioners were subsequently shown the pa-
per's results and conclusions, the results were labelled as 'obvious',
yet prior to the research, the same people could not tell what the
nature of any impact would be. Such 20-20 hindsight, with perfect
understanding after the event, is a commonly observed human
failing in many aspects of life.
Future research. Collectively, the results cover a large number of
construction operations. However, because of the many different
types of construction operations, not every type of operation can
possibly be covered in one paper. Future research could look at
these gaps. However, it is opined that the paper's results will hold
generally, and hold also for the multi-server case. It is also opined
that the paper's result will have applicability beyond construction.
The assumption made in the paper relates to both 'customers'
and 'servers' consuming energy or fuel and hence producing
emissions. This assumption could be relaxed in future research.
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