Environmental Impact in TLBMC for Building Construction Companies

The Business Model Canvas — a strategic business model design template proposed in 2005 by A. Osterwalder — represents with 9 blocks the main components of a business model: customer segments, value propositions, channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, key activities, key partnerships, and cost structure. Through this, these elements can cooperate and communicate with each other and have an overall perspective.

Nowadays, the diffusion of new business models is necessary given the importance of sustainable growth for companies. Sustainability should consider both the environmental and social aspects of a company, not only the economic aspect. In the last years the most influent companies are focussing on adopting a Triple Layered Business Model Canvas that also takes into account environmental and social aspects, and this is — in my opinion — one of the main global challenges for the future of our society. Some companies have already transformed their business model from a traditional one to a TLBMC, but there is still a long way to go and those who have not yet adopted it should do so, above all the environmental layer.

Below — in this article — I report an in-depth view of the environmental impact of a construction company.

The contributions to the general economy of the construction sector are considerable. Its worldwide turnover exceeds 3 trillion US dollars and accounts for about 10% of world GDP. Among the direct impacts of the sector on the environment, the most significant is the consumption of energy and non-regenerable natural resources.

Below is the Business Model Canvas of a traditional italian construction company:

It is estimated that the construction sector consumes about half of all extracted natural resources.

Below are all the elements to be taken into consideration for a correct business model that takes full account of all environmental aspects:

The entire life cycle of the products from the extraction of the raw material, transport, installation, up to disposal “from the cradle to the grave”, the method can be applied to each single product used and then to the entire infrastructure, according to precise work phases also defined by the ISO 14040 series of technical standards. Emission of dust, exhaust gases, solid pollutants, non-degradable building materials, glues and insulation, water pollution. Landscape damage: insertion of the building or civil infrastructure in the urban, extra-urban or naturalistic context. Consumption of resources: distinction between regenerable and non-regenerable (for example the use of rainwater), consideration of the adaptability of materials with pre-existing ones, availability on site. Energy consumption: origin of the renewable or non-renewable energy source, efficiency and thermal isolation.

Most of these considerations are the pillars of the so-called “green building”. A digital tool that helps to improve the efficiency and optimization of building design is the BIM (Building Information Modeling) which allows designers to store and share information about each product used and its characteristics, evaluate plant maintenance, plan interventions of construction and renovation.

Once these considerations have been brought to light, we describe in detail each section of the environmental layer of the TLBMC:

• The functional value describes the focal outputs of a service (or product) by the organization under examination. It emulates the functional unit in a life cycle assessment, which is a quantitative description of either the service performance or the needs fulfilled in the investigated product system.
• Materials refer to the bio-physical stocks used to render the functional value.
• The production component extends the key activities component from the original business model canvas to the environmental layer and captures the actions that the organization undertakes to create value.
• Supplies and out-sourcing represent all the other various material and production activities that are necessary for the functional value but not considered ‘core’ to the organization.
• Distribution involves the transportation of goods.
• The use phase focuses on the impact of the client’s partaking in the organization’s functional value, or core service and/or product.
• End-of-life is when the client chooses to end the consumption of the functional value and often entails issues of material reuse such as remanufacturing, repurposing, recycling, disassembly, incineration or disposal of a product.
• The environmental impacts component addresses the ecological costs of the organization’s actions.
• The environmental benefits are the ecological value that the organization creates through regenerative positive ecological value.

Below is the TLBMC environmental layer of a generic construction company by virtue of the 9-block BMC:

In conclusion, I add that the example given is an ideal and — in my opinion — every construction company should adopt those considerations and above all take into account the environmental impact “from cradle to the grave”.

Resources:

• R. Paquin, A. Joyce, Y. Pigneur — “The triple layered business model canvas: a tool to design more sustainable business models” 2015
• H. Kim R. Lee — “Software Engineering in IoT, Big Data, Cloud and Mobile Computing” 2021
• T. Clark, A. Osterwalder, Y. Pigneur — “Business Model You” 2012
• M. Monte, V. Torretta — “Valutazione e impatto ambientale” 2016
• S. Bruno — “Manuale di bioarchitettura” 2009