Actions at stage 1:

project inception and initial design Set out your requirements in the Project Brief. It is essential that the major opportunities to reduce, reuse and recover waste are identified and communicated from an early design stage, so that the cost-saving potential can be factored into tender prices. The basic elements are:

1.       Your corporate objective for reducing waste and landfill over time;

2.       Minimum and stretch outcomes for waste reduction, recovery and reuse on each project; and

3.        Requirements for waste measurement and reporting.

4.        Develop a Site Waste Management Plan (SWMP) at the design stage1 ;

5.         Set a project-specific target for waste reduction in addition to the targets for waste recovery and recycled content defined in the Project Brief;

6.         Report on waste reduction actions at design review meetings; and

7.        Identify the selected actions and associated cost savings in the tender invitation issued to potential contractors.

Actions at stage 2: detailed design

1.      Developed a forecast for waste

2.      Identified and quantified the most effective actions to reduce waste and the costs of waste (including reuse and recovery);

3.      Included these details in a SWMP (for projects over £300k in value); and

4.      Included these details in documents for contractor tendering and appointment.

As a check-list, see whether the design team has considered the following options (where relevant):

1.       Off site construction or selecting prefabricated components

2.       Reuse of construction, demolition and excavation materials on site;

3.       Changes in the design specification which reduce waste and materials use;

4.       Optimisation of the design, such as matching building and product dimensions;

5.       Reducing wastage allowances in expectation of SWMP actions achieving lower wastage rates on high volume/value components;

6.       Selecting durable components with low waste over their life-time;

7.       Providing facilities for segregating operational waste once the facility is in use.

Actions at stage 3: tender

Ensure that performance standards and requirements for waste measurement and reporting are included in the PQQs, tender documents and contracts for principal contractors

Actions at stage 4: project kick-off and pre-construction

includes plans for reducing wastage on site (lower wastage allowances on trade packages etc); for materials logistics (delivery and site storage); for waste recovery (site segregation etc); and for reuse on site (mobile processing plant etc);

Actions at stage 5: construction

1.       details of waste carriers and waste facility destinations;

2.       actual waste types and quantities produced; and

3.       whether waste was reused, recycled, recovered or sent for disposal.

I was about to give a simple answer when I saw Prem's answer. I reserve my comments! Well done Prem.

Definitely yes. A good design can contribute to waste reduction.

Given that each dwelling unit is a primary structure, and the root causes leading to housing quality problem are identified as issues related to housing layout and design, surrounding environment, maintenance, location, amenities, and building material, house builders should be aware of the potential for a good design in responding to the evolving social behaviour, and strike to take advantage of technology in the housing production process through integrating housing design with industrial construction system. 

In other words, each dwelling unit should be designed, in such a way that it is economically and easily adjustable, while adheres to the context of contemporary technology, climatic adaptation, and cultural responses.

As such, a good design should make use of the open plan design concept and the Industrialised Building System (IBS) construction method, to produce a variety of housing design options that meet possible user requirements not yet identified at the design stage, while retaining principal uniformity to facilitate the execution of simple but accurate construction with a minimal initial cost. All these, at the end, can directly lead to the achievement of various intangible benefits, such as clean site, less labour, less material usage, and the total reduction of the overall construction waste. 

In fact, it has been proven that a wider use of IBS in building design could considerably reduce construction waste generation and alleviate the burdens associated with its management.

The following are some papers that you may be interested with:

• Quantifying the waste reduction potential of using prefabrication in building construction in Hong Kong;
• Unleashing the potential of traditional construction technique in the development of modern urban mass housing.  

Comments are awesome. I think waste generation can be reduced after the performance definition, reduction can be achieved by the standardization of the project. In the design phase predicting the mandatory elements is useful, the reduction is influenced by the performance and function, though.