Framework Design

Objective 3 was to develop the framework and derive empirical weightings for the range of sustainability issues included in the assessment framework. Building on the previous work packages it was possible to integrate the sustainability issues pertinent to Aggregate Industries with those from 4 different sources namely, BREEAM, Ceequal, BES 6001, BS 8905 and the primary research carried out in section 4.3. This section explains how the sustainability issues were mapped and then describes the weighting process for these issues which then evolved into the assessment framework. Two conference papers were published explaining in more detail the processes presented here; these are presented in Appendices C (mapping of issues) and D (weighting exercise) respectively.

4.4.1 I

I

A key objective of the research was to identify a range of social, environmental and economic indicators which formed the areas of assessment in the framework. Aggregate Industries has a range of corporate sustainability plans relating to:

In addition there is a great focus (internally) on the efficiency of manufacturing, measures for adding value to raw materials and contribution.

The BS 8905 (2011) standard contains signposts to a number of existing methodologies and standards for environmental, social and economic issues. In order to arrive at the list of issues for the framework, the most recurring issues mentioned in BS 8905, BES 6001 (responsible sourcing), BREEAM, Ceequal and the primary research conducted (section 4.3) were identified and mapped against each other as shown in Table 4.6. In order to have a robust framework that addressed a holistic approach to sustainability assessment all of the issues shown on the left hand side of Table 4.6 were included in the framework and the subsequent weighting of issues described in the next section.

Table 4.6 Mapping the issues

4.4.1.1 Discussion

Life cycle assessment is the only issue to be present in all of the areas that were investigated;

it is itself (as explained in chapter 2) an established tool to assess the environmental impacts of products or services however what is evident from Table 4.6 is that LCA is only one part of the approach needed. Jeswani et al (2008) have already identified that there needs to be more options for the “broadening and deepening of LCA approaches”. This also supports that there are limitations to LCA as presented by Udo de Haes et al (2004). This framework is seeking to create a range of metrics and indicators that form the assessment framework; such an approach has been termed a “tool-box” by Udo de Haes et al (2004) “which they argue lacks consistency and propose that a hybrid LCA approach is a stronger methodology which would essentially end up becoming an extension of LCA. Whilst this point of view is acknowledged it is also necessary to understand the context in which the LCA is being applied. In an organisational context a toolbox approach that has an element of LCA built into the system is easily usable, transparent, does not require the employment of specialist LCA practitioners and relies on datasets and information that has mostly already been collated. In addition, having an elemental approach to the environmental aspect allows future developments in construction product LCA such as CEN TC 350 to be used and issues merged together. The approach may appear simplistic however this was the aim of the framework that it could be easily understood and therefore utilised” (Ghumra et al, 2011c; Appendix D).

4.4.2 I

S

W

The conference paper presented at the ARCOM (Association of Researchers in Construction Management) 2011 conference in Bristol (University of the West of England) was entitled

‘Validating a set of empirically weighted sustainability indicators for construction products’

(presented in full in appendix D). Following on from the previous paper which identified the sustainability issues this work package consisted of a survey to collate the weighting opinions, on the sustainability indicators, 35 individuals within Aggregate Industries participated in this survey. These results were aggregated to derive overall weightings for each sustainability indicator. Environmental, social and economic sections were considered equally and weighted indicators were developed within each of these sections” (Ghumra et al, 2011d, Appendix E).

It is important to weight the issues as some issues are inherently more significant than others.

The framework issues had not been developed into specific questions related to ready-mixed concrete at this stage. As such an on-line survey was circulated to 80 employees who were based in the central services functions of marketing, IT, audit, estates and finance. Of these 35 responded which represented a 43% response rate. This is clearly high for such a medium and was heavily influenced by the profile of the researcher in the business.

Central services personnel were chosen to avoid product specific bias. The aim of this activity was to weight the issues from a neutral perspective and this group of participants gave exactly that. The 35 respondents ranged from Director level to more junior management positions.

Also the time spent in the company ranged from 2 years to over 30 with an average of around 10 years time spent in Aggregate Industries.

4.4.2.1 Results

This section presents the results from the company survey in their raw form and gives the number of participants who selected a particular weighting level for the environmental, social and economic questions (Tables 4.7 to 4.9). Weighted averages were taken for each indicator to arrive at the final weighting for each indicator; this is presented at the end of the section (Table 4.10) alongside the corresponding weightings in BREEAM, Ceequal and BES 6001 to indicate how these indicators are weighted in the respective schemes and standards.

The weighting results of the environmental indicators are shown in Table 4.7. The water and biodiversity indicators show similar outcomes with the concentration of participants selecting lower importance weightings. LCA/Carbon footprinting is clearly the issue that the majority of participants felt were the most significant. Waste and recycled/secondary content have at least 70% of the weighting outcomes at 30% or below but still have a large spread of outcomes across the full range.

Table 4.7 Environmental indicators weighting results

Environmental Indicators 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%

LCA Carbon Footprinting 7 3 10 4 2 6 1 1 1

Water 19 9 1 0 0 1 0 1 1

Waste 6 10 9 3 1 2 2 1 0

Biodiversity 20 3 4 1 1 2 1 0 0

Recycled/Secondary Content 11 12 3 4 1 1 1 1 1

The weighting results of the social indicators are shown in Table 4.8. Overall there does not seem to be a clear issue that has been weighted consistently highly. Durability/ longevity has a range of weightings and along with community engagement is the only issue to have a single instance at 90%. Product properties and mode of delivery both have over half of the responses at 20% or below. Employment and skills has a similarly low weighting concentration below the 30% level.

Table 4.8 Social indicators weighting results

Social Indicators 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%

Durability/Longevity 3 9 11 3 3 1 2 0 1

Product Properties 12 10 3 3 2 1 1 0 0

Mode of Delivery 11 15 2 1 2 0 0 2 0

Employment & Skills 9 8 10 2 1 0 2 2 0

Community Engagement 11 9 5 1 2 1 0 2 1

The weighting results of the economic indicators are shown in Table 4.9. Profit margin and life cycle cost appear to have a greater number of weightings at 30% or over. Eighty percent of the cumulative responses are achieved at the 50% level for profit margin, at the 40% level

for life cycle cost and at the 30% level for the remaining two indicators. Weightings for these indicators will generally be higher than the environmental or social indicators (as there are four indicators as opposed to five).

Table 4.9 Economic indicators weighting results

Economic Indicators 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%

Profit Margin 2 4 13 4 4 6 1 0 1

Life Cycle Cost 4 8 9 6 3 2 1 0 2

Internal supply of materials 11 12 5 0 1 2 1 0 1

Equipment Efficiency 7 17 4 0 1 0 1 1 2

Table 4.10 Environmental, Social and Economic weightings Weighting %

Indicators Survey BREEAM Ceequal BES 6001

LCA / Carbon Footprinting 27.3 19.0 9.5 31

Water 14.6 6.0 8.5 10

Waste 22.7 7.5 8.4 10

Biodiversity 15.3 10.0 8.8 18

Recycled/Secondary Content 20.1 12.5 9.4 18

Durability/Longevity 24.3 12.5 9.4 -

Product Properties 17.3 - - -

Mode of Delivery 17.0 8.0 8.1 10

Employment & Skills 21.0 - - 10

Community Engagement 20.3 - 7.4 10

Profit Margin 30.8 - - -

Life Cycle Cost 27.7 - 9.4 -

Internal supply of materials 19.8 - - -

Equipment Efficiency 21.7 - - -

Table 4.10 shows the overall weightings of the survey indicators against the corresponding weightings from BREEAM, Ceequal and BES 6001. This has been done at a section level, e.g. durability and longevity appear in the materials sections of BREEAM and Ceequal and the entire materials section is weighted at 12.5% and 9.4% respectively, taking the weighting of the individual question would have made relative comparisons impossible. The purpose of Table 4.10 is not to draw comparisons between the absolute values of the weightings for each indicator, but to understand the relative positioning of the indicators to one another to validate the weightings of the survey indicators. The schemes and standards have different scopes and terms of reference; hence it would be unwise to extrapolate specific numerical similarities or differences on this basis.

4.4.2.2 Discussion

Generally it can be seen that the results of the survey map well to similar indicators used within the assessment tools for environmental issues showing broad data validity. When all of

the indicators are ranked on the basis of their respective weightings LCA Carbon footprinting (compared to Energy section weightings) is the most highly-weighted issue from all sources.

The weightings of environmental indicators embedded in the BES 6001 standard for responsible sourcing represents the closest match to the survey weightings, however comparisons for social indicators are difficult and there are no economic indicators to make comparisons against at all. BES 6001 could potentially be revised to explore a more structured approach to the economic aspect of the product assessment. This work could help to inform subsequent revisions of BES 6001 by considering the inclusion of the economic indicators including life cycle cost. This exercise has validated the empirically derived weightings of the sustainability issues that will form the basis of the assessment framework.

The weightings were conducted on the basis that social, environmental and economic issues are equally significant; a methodological position that could be argued and is explained further in section 5.2.2.

4.4.3 C

Objective 3 has been met by the publication of these two complementary work packages. The development of the sustainability issues were based on existing corporate policies, standards and assessments supplemented with primary research carried out as part of objective 2.

Economic issues were found to be less well defined in the leading assessment schemes such as BREEAM and Ceequal whereas the primary research of semi-structured interviews reflected on financial issues such as up front cost versus whole life cost.

The weighting process took these sustainability issues and grouped them into environmental, social and economic groups. Weightings were calculated within each of these groups so that the overall impact of the three sustainability issues (triple bottom line) remained equal.

Once the weightings exercise had been concluded and validated to a degree it was possible to apply performance criteria to these individual sustainability issues which are presented in the next section.