Scenario Planning for a Sustainable Reduction in Construction Delay and Disruption Disputes

Although the expected future impacts of climate change on the construction sector are significant and commonly accepted, the prospect and viability of contractual solutions to mitigate such effects lack investigation. Scenario planning enables leaders to prepare for the future by revealing the impending opportunities and threats to businesses and markets. This article offers analysis, synthesis, and evaluation of published literature and results from a scenario-planning workshop. The study reveals that climate change and profit margins are the main forces that will impact the construction sector in 2030. Evidential materials, contract provisions, and data repositories involving existing and emerging technologies are the three tenets of an innovative conceptual solution that can reduce delay and disruption disputes. This is significant because, inter alia, as the consequences of climate change are likely to increase, contract terms that allocate risks associated with it are likely to be modified, and insurance companies are liable to increase indemnification premiums, or become unable to cover such risks. The offered solution, namely the Trilateral Model, increases the sustainability of construction contracting in this context through a clear, impartial, acceptable, and effective risk allocation mechanism that mitigates the impact of those forces and offers contractual certainty.