Study Finds Most American Construction Companies Use Off-Site Construction
Emily Pollock posted on January 17, 2019 |
Workers lift an off-site-manufactured module into place on a construction site. (Image courtesy of Richard Southall.)
On January 7, the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) released a study revealing that most American construction companies use off-site construction methods for at least part of their work. But perhaps the most surprising thing about the results is that the number of workers using modular hasn’t actually gone up in the last four years.
In 2013, the NIBS established the Off-Site Construction Council (OSCC) as an “unbiased source for evaluating the applicability and potential benefits” of off-site construction. It conducted its first study of industry trends in 2014, concluding that most construction companies use some form of off-site construction. The 2018 study was commissioned to update its understanding of the marketplace.
The 2018 study surveyed 205 “construction stakeholders”: management, general contractors, engineers, trade contractors, architects and developers. It found that 87.6 percent of respondents had used some type of off-site fabrication over the last year, and that 81.6 percent planned to use off-site construction the same amount or more in 2019. In comparison, 93 percent of respondents in 2014 said that they’d used off-site construction in the past year, and 83 percent said they were…