A comparative study of environmental performance between prefabricated and traditional residential buildings in China

• PRB construction has obvious advantage in saving materials except concrete.
• PRB construction is more efficient in energy use.
• PRB construction has significant benefit in minimizing solid waste.
• Prefabrication technology demonstrated advantages in total environmental performance.

Prefabrication technology has been heavily promoted by the Chinese government due to its potential to improve construction quality and productivity. However, there is an urgent need to assess the environmental performance of prefabrication technology to identify whether it is an effective method that is conducive to sustainable development. This study considered two typical residential projects using the two technologies to conduct a fair comparison between prefabrication technology and cast-in-situ technology. Various measuring methods, including content analysis, face-to-face interviews and on-site measurements, were used for data collection. Environmental impact (EI) categories selected for the study included resource depletion, energy consumption and construction waste discharge. Two life cycle assessment (LCA)-based models, the construction environmental performance assessment system (CEPAS) and the building health impact assessment system (BHIAS), were integrated to measure the EI of the two construction technologies based on three damage categories, namely, ecosystem damage, resource depletion and health damage. Finally, social willingness to pay (WTP) was applied to integrate the damage categories for comparisons. The results indicated that the sample prefabricated residential building (PRB) construction was more efficient in energy use, with a 20.49% reduction in total consumption compared to the sample traditional residential building (TRB) construction. The use of prefabrication demonstrated a certain degree of advantages in EI, including a 35.82% reduction in resource depletion, a 6.61% reduction in health damage and a 3.47% reduction in ecosystem damage. Prefabrication technology was more environmentally friendly because of its advantages in reducing damage to the environment compared with traditional cast-in-situ construction technology.