Use of float consumption rate in resource leveling of construction projects

The management of resources has been claimed to be as important as scheduling methods. Inefficiency in managing resources may bring about severe delays and cost overruns caused by resource shortages in some cases and/or idle resources in others. Therefore, resources should be utilized efficiently to prevent project failures. Resource leveling is one of the approaches that are used for the management of resources. It aims to minimize fluctuations, peaks, and valleys in resource utilization without changing the completion time of a project and the number of resources required. Although the main principle behind traditional resource leveling is achieving an even flow of resources while the original project duration remains unchanged, the literature supports the need to develop an efficient model that discriminates among the activities that are selected for participation in resource leveling. For this purpose, this study has developed a model that considers the float consumption rates of activities in resource leveling. The float consumption rate is the percentage that is set to determine the maximum amount of float which will be consumed to shift the start time of the activity. The proposed model allows a scheduler to assign float consumption rates to each activity that can be used during the resource leveling procedure. When the required information is inputted, the proposed model automatically changes the required daily resources as it shifts the noncritical activities along their available total float times. The proposed model is expected to minimize the likelihood of severe delays and cost overruns. The model is demonstrated by constructing a network and its resource utilization histograms.