Author: Laura Black

Earth Day is roughly a month away. Every year on April 22, Earth Day marks the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970. To prepare, let’s embark on a short blog series focusing on sustainability in the construction industry. First up, sustainability in our buildings. We have all heard the dire statistics. Roughly 37% of all greenhouse gas emissions come from the construction and operation of the built environment, according to the United Nations. Certainly, this impacts the environment, but it also impacts pocketbooks. In the current real estate market, operational costs and sustainability are crucial,…

The construction industry is well aware of the challenges with concrete, such as the fact the concrete industry is responsible for 8% of the global CO₂  emissions. Concrete is also one of the most consumed materials in the world, second only to water. How, then, can we be more responsible and sustainable, as we look to rebuild our homes, buildings, cities, and infrastructure? That is the question many stakeholders are asking today. There are many options to address this challenge head on in the future. Let’s consider some of the solutions. As one example, we have reported on C-Crete Technologies…

The construction market is an interesting one now. From the labor shortage to cost volatility, there is much to consider as we move forward. Let’s consider the current state of the construction to identify how to navigate it in 2024 and beyond. Currie & Brown suggests there are many challenges in today’s construction market including geopolitical turmoil, inflation, materials and skills shortages, and tightening sustainability regulation, just to name a few. As a result, many of these factors are driving up construction costs globally, with costs rising by 3.64% last year alone. Certainly, this isn’t a new challenge. In the…

While there were a bevy of announcements at last week’s NAHB (National Assn. of Home Builders) IBS (Intl. Builders Show), home appliances and HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) were certainly some of the splashiest—but will builders take the bait and move forward in the next era of electrification in the home? Certainly, we would hope the answer would be yes, but it isn’t always that cut and dry. Let’s look at a few examples from the show. Specifically focused for the residential builder market, LG’s energy-efficient heat pump technology, inverter technology, and air solutions maximize energy efficiency in the…

I am easily enticed when it comes to productivity hacks. Perhaps there is no greater place to heighten workplace efficiency than with emails, as emails consume roughly two hours per day for the average worker. This is certainly true in construction, as it is in other industries. Consider the research from PPM Express, which suggests establishing time for emails can be challenging when managing a construction team. The statistics are staggering too. Each day in 2022, an estimated 333 billion emails were sent and received worldwide, and this figure is projected to surge to 392.5 billion daily emails by 2026.…

Hopefully, innovation is something that is encouraged and celebrated all year long, but for some it is commemorated on February 16—Innovation Day—to recognize the role that new knowledge plays in spurring creativity and ingenuity in an organization. Such is the case for Skanska USA, which launched Skanska Sidekick on Innovation Day last week. Skanska Sidekick is a proprietary chatbot designed to alter how solutions are delivered to customers. Here’s how it works: Sidekick leverages the same underlying technology as ChatGPT, and all data that is input into these internal tools will remain within the Skanska Cloud to ensure the safety…

Consumers and businesses are expected to generate twice as much data in the next five years as all the data created over the past 10 years. The rise of AI (artificial intelligence) and other technologies will change the way we build homes, cities, and infrastructure. Perhaps the most obvious example of this is at the data center. Data centers are built with different requirements than conventional facilities and may require contractors and operators to plan, design, and allocate power resources based on the type of data processed or stage of generative AI development. Maybe we should look at what comes…

On a construction jobsite, a hard hat has one primary function: to keep a worker’s head safe. With the rise of technology, will a hard hat soon serve more than one function? An announcement from World of Concrete may change things for construction companies. Before we dig into the new announcement, let’s look back. When we talk smart hard hats for construction, many people’s thoughts may first go to DAQRI, which was an AR (augmented reality) company that launched in 2010 with a big vision: to provide an AR smart helmet. The company folded less than a decade later. Here…

The secret to solving the labor shortage in construction is actually pretty simple: find workers. Of course, that is easier said than done for a number of reasons that we will explore here in this blog. Perhaps one of the biggest reasons is that for the past several decades parents have strongly encouraged their children to attend college and ignore a career in the trades. But is this all beginning to change? Let’s take a look at the numbers. What Do Parents Really Want Today? Journey back with me for a minute more than a decade. A 2011 Pew Research…

As I am watching snow blanket the Chicagoland suburbs, I am currently typing these words on a computer in a dark, cold room. The only reason I am able to type these words right now is because my computer has a full battery from being charged earlier this morning. I debated not opening my computer to conserve the battery further, but the reality is this device is rather useless because both my internet and power is out—and I am frustrated. I am frustrated that in today’s modern era we don’t have the infrastructure to maintain power during natural disasters. I…