Kareem Abushama

The built environment plays a central role in climate change mitigation, with deep foundation systems accounting for a disproportionately high share of embodied carbon within structural works. Although recent research has demonstrated that substantial carbon savings can be achieved through optimised pile dimensions, material efficiency, and alternative design approaches, the translation of these solutions into routine engineering practice remains slow. This study investigates the factors shaping industry decisions regarding low-carbon foundation design in the United Kingdom. A qualitative research design was adopted, based on semi-structured interviews with ten experienced geotechnical consultants and piling contractors. The interview data were examined using thematic analysis to uncover recurring patterns influencing design and procurement behaviour.The findings indicate that current practice is governed by a conservative, cost-prioritised decision framework in which perceived technical and contractual risks frequently outweigh environmental considerations. Liability concerns, fragmented responsibilities, and established specification habits reinforce conservative design margins and limit experimentation. Nevertheless, several enabling conditions were identified, including the demand for demonstrable field performance, stronger collaboration at early project stages, and the formal integration of low-carbon approaches into standards and guidance documents. The paper argues that decarbonising deep foundations requires not only technical optimisation but also structural shifts in incentives, evidence generation, and professional norms.

The construction industry is a major contributor to the global climate crisis, prompting increasing interest in minimising the embodied carbon of structures, whether through material production regulations or the optimisation of structural elements. While a wide body of literature addresses the reduction of embodied carbon in superstructures, limited attention has been devoted to the optimisation of foundations, particularly piles. This research introduces a hybrid genetic algorithm optimisation tool designed to minimise the embodied carbon of tension piles in different soil conditions. Six different pile types are analysed: solid and hollow concrete piles, steel pipes, universal column (UC) sections, and timber piles in both square and circular forms. The optimal design parameters for each pile type on undrained clay and loose sand are presented and compared. The results demonstrate the potential for reducing the embodied carbon of tension piles when utilising optimised designs. Finally, a case study involving an 8-metre-high cross-road signpost is presented, illustrating the practical application of the proposed optimisation algorithm for reducing embodied carbon in future designs.

The construction industry is a major contributor to the global climate crisis, prompting increasing interest in minimising the embodied carbon of structures, whether through material production regulations or the optimisation of structural elements. While a wide body of literature addresses the reduction of embodied carbon in superstructures, limited attention has been devoted to the optimisation of foundations, particularly piles. This research introduces a hybrid genetic algorithm optimisation tool designed to minimise the embodied carbon of tension piles in different soil conditions. Six different pile types are analysed: solid and hollow concrete piles, steel pipes, UC sections, and timber piles in both square and round forms. The optimal design parameters for each pile type are presented and compared for undrained clay and loose sand. The results demonstrate the potential for reducing the embodied carbon of piles when utilising optimised designs. Finally, a case study involving an 8-metre-high crossroad signpost is presented, illustrating the practical application of the proposed optimisation algorithm in reducing embodied carbon for future designs.

The construction industry is responsible for a considerable share of the carbon emissions annually. Despite the wide body of literature addressing the embodied carbon of superstructures, limited attention is given to the embodied carbon of substructures. This research introduces an optimization algorithm to minimize the embodied carbon of deep foundations. The algorithm is used to optimize and then compare the embodied carbon of concrete, timber, and steel piles at different pile capacities. Results show that for clay soils and low pile capacities, timber piles are the least emitting compared to other materials, while steel piles are the highest emitting. The algorithm is then applied to a case study in London clay and demonstrated embodied carbon savings of up to 76% compared to current pile designs showing a high potential to reduce the embodied carbon and achieve the net-zero future goal in the construction industry.

Many studies have addressed the embodied carbon of superstructures, however, the carbon footprint of substructures has only been investigated to a limited extent. This study aims to optimize the design of reinforced concrete piles through finding the best combination of concrete design parameters, this is done using a hybrid-optimization algorithm that uses a genetic algorithm to find the optimal pile design. Moreover, the optimization algorithm is used to test the effect of pile geometry on the embodied carbon. Results show that for solid piles, utilizing the optimal design parameters leads to a significant cut in the total embodied carbon compared to common pile designs. However, solid piles proved to be the least efficient environmentally compared to other geometries.