Toward Safer, More Sustainable and More Efficient Construction

Innovation in construction is about more than introducing new technology. It’s about identifying a process that can be furthered, or a challenge to be solved, and honing the technology or material to fit that need. The best way to do that is to thoroughly vet and pilot innovations on active jobsites.

DPR’s office under construction in Santa Clara, CA, provided an opportunity to do just that. Our new headquarters is a proving ground for various innovations that have the potential to make construction processes safer, more sustainable and more efficient.

The Santa Clara office is a major overhaul of an existing building built in 1980 known as “the wedge” for its distinctly angled profile. The 131,000+-sq.-ft. project is incorporating sustainable solutions, such as a mass timber structure that will offset carbon, coupled with a specialized lower carbon concrete mix.

In concert with DPR strategic partners and structural engineers GPLA, and DPR’s self-perform work teams, a mix was created that reduced the amount of cement clinker, a material normally used in Portland cement that is a key contributor to carbon emissions and requires high amounts of energy to produce. The new mix utilized fly ash and slag, two materials abundant in the Bay Area, as well as waste CO2 from other industrial processes, to produce a mix with 38% less CO2 than the industry average – a savings equivalent to about 277 gasoline-powered cars driven for one year.

In addition to materials, we also wanted to see how we could use innovation to streamline processes during construction.

One process we are targeting for efficiency is steel framing. WND Ventures, DPR’s venture capital arm, worked with company Hyperframe to intentionally select the most congested area of the building to test a new system for steel framing. Hyperframe is essentially a snap-together steel framing system that leverages the high level of detail inherent in Building Information Modeling (BIM). When properly executed, this solution delivers a manufacturing-level quality for the finished product.

Utilizing Hyperframe, the studs, headers and sills all “clip” into each other with no screws required. Each component includes a QR code that can be scanned to bring up visual prompts to snap it into place. When we started on the project, the Hyperframe software utilized a Mixed Reality headset to scan the code and bring up the drawing with visual prompts. But we quickly realized that the headset limited the workflow, as only one worker could view the install instructions at a time. We also realized that a simpler version of the software would be one using a mobile device, as most workers have one already. We worked with the company to develop an iPhone/iPad compatible app with the same viewing capabilities that was more user friendly and allowed the install instructions to be viewed by multiple workers.

We also tested the BIM coordination capability of Hyperframe’s BIM tool, HyperBIM. One reason we selected the most congested area of the building was because we wanted to ensure HyperBIM could work in the trickiest of conditions. In this situation, we learned that an installer’s experience is invaluable and there is only so much that you can automate in the software. The installer’s experience helped Hyperframe reconfigure certain install conditions in the software. This pilot of Hyperframe was very promising, as we’ve been able to demonstrate three times the productivity compared with traditional steel framing.

Robots have a lot of potential to eliminate common strains craft workers endure through activities such as overhead drilling and layout. That was the premise of two robots we are using at the site: Jaibot and FieldPrinter. Jaibot is an overhead drilling robot produced by Hilti, while FieldPrinter is produced by Dusty Robotics as a layout solution that streamlines the BIM-to-field process, automatically printing critical information onto a flat floor.

Jaibots have been tested on quite a few of our jobsites now, and we’ve helped refine the design, partnering with Hilti to provide feedback. A deep knowledge of the detailed sequence of drilling, as well as the exact motions to take while drilling overhead, are required to successfully integrate these robots into the process. At our Santa Clara office we’ve worked with Hilti to further understand the functionality of Jaibot as well as defining how to maximize its potential.

In Dusty’s case, use of the robot is a standard practice for us now, but each project gives further learning opportunities. Dusty provides six times the layout efficiency and DPR has 6+ robots in our fleet deployed across our 32 business units. It made a lot of sense for us to use Dusty at our new flagship HQ.

When we pilot solutions, we are also looking long term to every stage of the building’s lifecycle. One important way we’re doing that in Santa Clara will be through the use of facility management software SiteLine, produced by another DPR strategic partner VueOps, which is essentially a digital twin data model. The software features a centralized, searchable digital plan room where building assets can be layered over top of the original plan to track and manage them over time. The functionality enables teams to develop insights about equipment that may need repair, analyze performance, and make ‘fix or replace’ decisions that improve facility reliability.

Long term also means looking at how we approach pilots themselves. Piloting technology and materials is a necessary path forward for the construction industry. As true tests, they may not always work out, but there is a lot to be learned even when we don’t determine that a new tool or material should scale up to more project sites. And when we do see that success, it’s gratifying to know that we have a small part in streamlining a process, or making it safer, or building something with less impact to the environment.