A Model for Assisting Concreting Decisions in Hot Weather Conditions

Concreting in hot weather conditions is a major challenge in construction projects with a dominant effect on concrete quality. As such, identifying the most favorable time for concreting within hot weather periods can be of valuable importance to minimize the risks associated with declined concrete performance or process failure. This work aims to provide a decision model for identifying the most favorable concreting deployment time in construction operations, under hot weather conditions (mainly referring to ambient temperatures above 27°C and high evaporation rates), based on short-term meteorological forecasts. The study develops a semi-empirical model for describing the potential adverse outcomes in concrete performance due to hot weather conditions and provides a cost assessment of the countermeasures for offsetting high evaporation rate and strength degradation, in addition to the cost of potential delay in order to obtain better concreting conditions. This model has been tested with meteorological data from two Mediterranean cities. The results indicate that, based on ambient and concrete temperature, wind speed, and relative humidity input values, the model can provide reasonable and practical decision assistance in scheduling concreting operations in a stochastically optimal manner.