Time-stepped, simulation-based scheduling system for large-scale industrial construction projects

Abstract

Industrial construction projects have recently moved more towards tighter schedules and fast-tracked engineering and construction. This leads to overlap between work packages, increased occurrences of resource over-allocation and site congestion, which pose challenges to project planners in scheduling construction works and dynamically allocating resources considering the construction site conditions. Most previous research related to scheduling and resource allocation assumes that allocated resources remain consistent throughout the execution of work packages. This paper presents a workface planning system that allows for variable resource allocation and variable durations in execution of a work package, while holding logic relationships and space congestion constraints. A case study from a real industrial project is presented and results show that the proposed system reduces resource idle time as well as returns shorter project duration than traditional scheduling approaches.

Utilizing simulation to predict optimum number of projects

“…They used sensor data of weather, truck speed, and other data to simulate fame work for real-time planning of snow removal operations. Also, (Hu and Mohamed 2013) utilized it in Industrial construction projects in the planning process to be capable of dynamic planning based on upcoming constraints. These models are utilized to help decision-makers in choosing the best fit scenario for the case constraints and within its stochastic environment.…”

Flexible resource management and its effect on project cost and duration

“…Some researchers utilized simulation to schedule tasks in the construction industry (Lu 2003;Lu et al 2008;Liu et al 2015;and Hu and Mohamed 2013). Khadem et al (2017) utilized simulation to estimate delays and budget on a case study from an oil and gas industry.…”