Robotics in building construction: Advantages and Barriers

Building construction activities present different problems, such as low productivity, quality issues, exposure to hazardous work, among others. Although Industry 4.0 proposes technological solutions associated with the use of robotics, the construction sector’s involvement in this field is still in its early stages of development. Therefore, this research analyzes the main advantages that could generate the use of robotics in building construction, identified with a literature review and scored according to the opinions of construction specialists in a country where it is desired to implement this technology. In the same way, the main barriers that could limit its implementation are analyzed, also identified, and scored with a bibliographic review and expert opinions. Thus, a bibliographic review of scientific articles related to the topic was started, identifying a total of 27. Then, reviewing the content of these articles, a list of advantages and barriers was generated, which were then used to prepare a survey where these were rated in pairs, using the AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) method, and rank them from the most important to those of lesser importance. Peru was taken as a case study, and a total of 52 respondents were obtained, who meet the profile of being highly experienced engineering or architectural professionals in building construction projects. Finally, it has been identified that the main advantages would be the improvement in construction quality (25.8%), increased worker safety (23.9%) and the increase in work speed (19.2%). Similarly, the main barriers are the cost of implementation and operation (20.4%), Human-machine safety (20.0%), and the required capabilities (17.1%). In this way, this methodology can be replicated in other countries or cities planning to implement robotics in building construction.