A Web Service Framework for Environmental and Carbon Footprint Monitoring in Construction Supply Chains

With the growing environmental concerns, green supply chain management (GSCM) is gaining significant attention in the construction industry. Tracking and monitoring the environmental effects brought forth by the participating members along a supply chain is important to GSCM. The GreenSCOR model developed by the Supply Chain Council provides a generic framework for measuring the total carbon footprint and environmental footprint in a supply chain. The model is based on the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model, which represents a supply chain network in a hierarchically structured manner. This paper describes the GreenSCOR framework and its potential application to the construction industry. This paper also presents a web services approach to incorporate the GreenSCOR model to the implementation of collaborative information systems. Each process element in the SCOR model is represented and delivered as individual web service units, which can be reused and integrated using standard web service technologies. The service units are combined and managed in a web service collaborative framework, called SC Collaborator, that is designed and developed for supporting construction supply chain management. An illustrative example is presented to demonstrate the implementation of the GreenSCOR-based SC Collaborator framework.