Multi-criteria Decision-making for Construction

Question 1

Engineering project key decisions

Answer 1

What materials?
What structural configuration?
What location?

Question 2

Key Features of MCDM?

Answer 2

Identification and evaluation of multiple criteria or objectives.
Criteria may be conflicting, uncertain, and/or subjective.
Provides a structured approach by using maths and/or analytical models

Question 3

MCDM helps with decision making by:

Answer 3

• Gain better understanding of problem
• Organising and synthesising range of info
• Integrating objective measurements with value judgements
• Managing subjectivity
• Taking into account all criteria and decision factors

Question 4

MCDM steps

Answer 4

1. Problem definition
2. Criteria definition
3. Alternatives
4. Scoring
5. Evaluation

Question 5

Advantages of MCDM

Answer 5

• Comprehensive & structural approach to decision making
• Allows multiple criteria
• Identifies trade-offs & most preferred alternatives

Question 6

Disadvantages of MCDM

Answer 6

• Time-consuming & resource-intensive
• Involves bias/subjective judgements (for weighting & scoring)
• Weightings will affect the final decision

Question 7

What are the design pillars?

Answer 7

Social
Environmental
Economic
Sustainability

Question 8

Sustainability standard?

Answer 8

EN 15643:2021
Sustainability of construction works - Framework for assessment of buildings and civil engineering works

Question 9

Environmental criteria!

Answer 9

• Water (consumption/depletion, eutrophication)
• Air (Greenhouse gas emissions, global warming, ozone, pollution)
• Biodiversity
• Resource use and waste (material extraction, energy use, waste generation/management)
• Land and soil (habitat destruction, changes to land use)

Question 10

Economic criteria!

Answer 10

• Construction costs
• Use costs
• Maintenance costs
• End of life costs

Question 11

Social criteria!

Answer 11

• Workers (H&S, modern slavery, working conditions)
• Safety (during construction, during use)
• Users (H&S, thermal performance, air quality/comfort, accessibility)
• Local community (disruptions, noise, air quality, landscape changes)
• Value chain actors (Social responsibility, fair competition, fair working conditions)
• Society (quality of life)

Question 12

Types of MCDM methods

Answer 12

1. Multi-criteria value functions
2. Pairwise comparisons
3. Distance to ideal point
4. Outranking approaches

Question 13

1. Multi-criteria value functions MIVES

Answer 13

Evaluate each alternative as sum of the weighted performance scores.
Weighted average

Question 14

2. Pairwise comparisions (AHP)

Answer 14

Compare criteria & alternatives in every unique pair.

Question 15

3. Distance to ideal point methods (TOPSIS)

Answer 15

Identify ideal and anti-ideal values for the criteria and align options that are closest to each

Question 16

4. Outranking approaches (PROMETHEE)

Answer 16

identify every pair of decision options and apply utility function containing criteria weights

Question 17

MIVES steps

Answer 17

1. Theoretical framework definition
2. Normalisation of indicators
3. Weighting & aggregation of function
4. Sensitivity analysis
   conclusions