Building More Prefab Homes Can Help Construction Go Greener

Even with an abundance of solar panels, and smart HVAC systems, and building to Passive House standards, one construction expert argues that prefab homes are “the secret to green building.”

Karen Manley, professor of construction management at Queensland University of Technology, Australia, writes that prefab buildings are “are higher quality and more sustainable than buildings constructed on-site through manual labor. They are potentially twice as efficient compared to on-site building.” Such efficiency is key in an industry that globally consumes 34 percent of all energy consumed, compared to the transport sector’s 27 percent and the industry’s sector 28 percent.

The argument is that modular buildings are built in factories, with better quality control systems than buildings built from scratch at the jobsite, such as improved insulation placement for better energy efficiency.

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