Evaluating industrial modularization strategies: Local vs. overseas fabrication

Modularization is becoming more popular in industrial construction to enhance various project management aspects, including time, cost, safety, quality, and productivity. Although many studies have highlighted the differences between modular and conventional (stick-built) construction, little research is conducted to evaluate alternative fabrication strategies (e.g., overseas versus local fabrication). Some practitioners prefer to build modules locally, while some others prefer to outsource the module fabrication overseas and ship them to the industrial plant. This dramatically affects the decision on the size of the module envelope, and in turn, many other associated factors. The purpose of this study is to develop an integrated framework to evaluate different module fabrication strategies. This study employs various automation tools (e.g., building information modeling (BIM), simulation modeling) to quantify the impact of module fabrication strategies on any selected industrial project. The proposed framework considers various project aspects such as shipment and handling, fabrication, lifting, module resizing, and module assembly yard to find the best fabrication strategy. An actual case study, part of an industrial plant in Alberta, Canada, is presented in this paper to elucidate research contributions.