An Economic Assessment of Selected Integration and Automation Technologies

This paper presents a critical analysis of the economic impacts of past, ongoing, and planned research of BFRL’s construction systems integration and automation technologies (CONSIAT) program. The CONSIAT program is an interdisciplinary research effort within BFRL to develop key enabling technologies, standard communication protocols, and advanced measurement technologies needed to facilitate the delivery of fully-integrated and automated project process (FIAPP) products and services to the construction industry. BFRL is participating in a public-private partnership focused on early commercialization of FIAPP products and services. The results of this analysis demonstrate that the use of FIAPP products and services will generate substantial cost savings to the capital facilities industry. The present value of savings nationwide expected from the use of FIAPP products and services in capital facilities over the next 15 years exceeds $3.5 billion. The present value of cost savings due to the public-private partnership’s efforts focused on early commercialization of FIAPP products and services is expected to exceed $280 million.