PROJECT PLANNING FOR GREEN FIELD PLANT/FACTORY CONSTRUCTION
In developing a construction plan, it is common to adopt a primary emphasis on either cost control or on schedule control
Some projects are primarily divided into expense categories with associated costs. In these cases, construction planning is cost or expense oriented. Within the categories of expenditure, a distinction is made between costs incurred directly in the performance of an activity and indirectly for the accomplishment of the project. For example, borrowing expenses for project financing and overhead items are commonly treated as indirect costs.
For other projects, scheduling of work activities over time is critical and is emphasized in the planning process. In this case, the planner insures that the proper precedences among activities are maintained and that efficient scheduling of the available resources prevails. Traditional scheduling procedures emphasize the maintenance of task precedences (resulting in critical path scheduling procedures) or efficient use of resources over time (resulting in job shop scheduling procedures)
Finally, most complex projects require consideration of both cost and scheduling over time, so that planning, monitoring and record keeping must consider both dimensions. In these cases, the integration of schedule and budget information is a major concern.
Choice of Technology and Construction Method
Defining Work Tasks
More formally, an activity is any subdivision of project tasks. The set of activities defined for a project should be comprehensive or completely exhaustive so that all necessary work tasks are included in one or more activities. Typically, each design element in the planned facility will have one or more associated project activities.
Execution of an activity requires time and resources, including manpower and equipment, as described in the next section.
The time required to perform an activity is called the duration of the activity.
The beginning and the end of activities are signposts or milestones, indicating the progress of the project. Occasionally, it is useful to define activities which have no duration to mark important events.
It is generally advantageous to introduce an explicit hierarchy of work activities for the purpose of simplifying the presentation and development of a schedule. For example, the initial plan might define a single activity associated with "site clearance." Later, this single activity might be sub-divided into "re-locating utilities," "removing vegetation," "grading", etc. However, these activities could continue to be identified as sub-activities under the general activity of "site clearance." This hierarchical structure also facilitates the preparation of summary charts and reports in which detailed operations are combined into aggregate or "super"-activities
Defining Precedence Relationships Among Activities
Once work activities have been defined, the relationships among the activities can be specified. Precedence relations between activities signify that the activities must take place in a particular sequence. Numerous natural sequences exist for construction activities due to requirements for structural integrity, regulations, and other technical requirements. For example, design drawings cannot be checked before they are drawn. Diagramatically, precedence relationships can be illustrated by a network or graph in which the activities are represented by arrows
Estimating Activity Durations
In most scheduling procedures, each work activity has an associated time duration. These durations are used extensively in preparing a schedule
All formal scheduling procedures rely upon estimates of the durations of the various project activities as well as the definitions of the predecessor relationships among tasks. The variability of an activity's duration may also be considered. Formally, the probability distribution of an activity's duration as well as the expected or most likely duration may be used in scheduling. A probability distribution indicates the chance that a particular activity duration will occur. In advance of actually doing a particular task, we cannot be certain exactly how long the task will require.
Estimating Resource Requirements for Work Activities
In addition to precedence relationships and time durations, resource requirements are usually estimated for each activity. Since the work activities defined for a project are comprehensive, the total resources required for the project are the sum of the resources required for the various activities. By making resource requirement estimates for each activity, the requirements for particular resources during the course of the project can be identified. Potential bottlenecks can thus be identified, and schedule, resource allocation or technology changes made to avoid problems.
Many formal scheduling procedures can incorporate constraints imposed by the availability of particular resources.
Some projects are primarily divided into expense categories with associated costs. In these cases, construction planning is cost or expense oriented. Within the categories of expenditure, a distinction is made between costs incurred directly in the performance of an activity and indirectly for the accomplishment of the project. For example, borrowing expenses for project financing and overhead items are commonly treated as indirect costs.
For other projects, scheduling of work activities over time is critical and is emphasized in the planning process. In this case, the planner insures that the proper precedences among activities are maintained and that efficient scheduling of the available resources prevails. Traditional scheduling procedures emphasize the maintenance of task precedences (resulting in critical path scheduling procedures) or efficient use of resources over time (resulting in job shop scheduling procedures)
Finally, most complex projects require consideration of both cost and scheduling over time, so that planning, monitoring and record keeping must consider both dimensions. In these cases, the integration of schedule and budget information is a major concern.
Choice of Technology and Construction Method
Once the full plan is available, then the cost, time and reliability impacts of the alternative approaches can be reviewed. This examination of several alternatives is often made explicit in bidding competitions in which several alternative designs may be proposed or value engineering for alternative construction methods may be permitted. In this case, potential constructors may wish to prepare plans for each alternative design using the suggested construction method as well as to prepare plans for alternative construction methods which would be proposed as part of the value engineering process.
In forming a construction plan, a useful approach is to simulate the construction process either in the imagination of the planner or with a formal computer based simulation technique. By observing the result, comparisons among different plans or problems with the existing plan can be identified. For example, a decision to use a particular piece of equipment for an operation immediately leads to the question of whether or not there is sufficient access space for the equipment. Three dimensional geometric models in a computer aided design (CAD) system may be helpful in simulating space requirements for operations and for identifying any interferences. Similarly, problems in resource availability identified during the simulation of the construction process might be effectively forestalled by providing additional resources as part of the construction plan.
Defining Work Tasks
These work tasks represent the necessary framework to permit scheduling of construction activities, along with estimating the resources required by the individual work tasks, and any necessary precedences or required sequence among the tasks.
The terms work "tasks" or "activities" are often used interchangeably in construction plans to refer to specific, defined items of work.
In job shop or manufacturing terminology, a project would be called a "job" and an activity called an "operation", but the sense of the terms is equivalent.
The scheduling problem is to determine an appropriate set of activity start time, resource allocations and completion times that will result in completion of the project in a timely and efficient fashion.
Construction planning is the necessary fore-runner to scheduling. In this planning, defining work tasks, technology and construction method is typically done either simultaeously or in a series of iterations.
The definition of appropriate work tasks can be a laborious and tedious process, yet it represents the necessary information for application of formal scheduling procedures
More formally, an activity is any subdivision of project tasks. The set of activities defined for a project should be comprehensive or completely exhaustive so that all necessary work tasks are included in one or more activities. Typically, each design element in the planned facility will have one or more associated project activities.
Execution of an activity requires time and resources, including manpower and equipment, as described in the next section.
The time required to perform an activity is called the duration of the activity.
The beginning and the end of activities are signposts or milestones, indicating the progress of the project. Occasionally, it is useful to define activities which have no duration to mark important events.
It is generally advantageous to introduce an explicit hierarchy of work activities for the purpose of simplifying the presentation and development of a schedule. For example, the initial plan might define a single activity associated with "site clearance." Later, this single activity might be sub-divided into "re-locating utilities," "removing vegetation," "grading", etc. However, these activities could continue to be identified as sub-activities under the general activity of "site clearance." This hierarchical structure also facilitates the preparation of summary charts and reports in which detailed operations are combined into aggregate or "super"-activities
Defining Precedence Relationships Among Activities
Once work activities have been defined, the relationships among the activities can be specified. Precedence relations between activities signify that the activities must take place in a particular sequence. Numerous natural sequences exist for construction activities due to requirements for structural integrity, regulations, and other technical requirements. For example, design drawings cannot be checked before they are drawn. Diagramatically, precedence relationships can be illustrated by a network or graph in which the activities are represented by arrows
Estimating Activity Durations
In most scheduling procedures, each work activity has an associated time duration. These durations are used extensively in preparing a schedule
All formal scheduling procedures rely upon estimates of the durations of the various project activities as well as the definitions of the predecessor relationships among tasks. The variability of an activity's duration may also be considered. Formally, the probability distribution of an activity's duration as well as the expected or most likely duration may be used in scheduling. A probability distribution indicates the chance that a particular activity duration will occur. In advance of actually doing a particular task, we cannot be certain exactly how long the task will require.
Estimating Resource Requirements for Work Activities
In addition to precedence relationships and time durations, resource requirements are usually estimated for each activity. Since the work activities defined for a project are comprehensive, the total resources required for the project are the sum of the resources required for the various activities. By making resource requirement estimates for each activity, the requirements for particular resources during the course of the project can be identified. Potential bottlenecks can thus be identified, and schedule, resource allocation or technology changes made to avoid problems.
Many formal scheduling procedures can incorporate constraints imposed by the availability of particular resources.
