India’s construction sector is witnessing significant growth as it moves towards becoming a $1.4 trillion market by 2025, as per industry estimates. In line with these ambitious targets, recent years have seen a remarkable rise in construction across infrastructure sectors. This has also led to the adoption of modern construction techniques. One of the key techniques accelerating construction activities is the use of precast or prefabricated components. Precast construction offers a viable alternative to existing conventional techniques. Thus, it has been widely adopted across various sectors including airports, railways, urban rail and roads.
Railways and station redevelopment
There has been a greater emphasis on the adoption of prefabrication in the railway sector, aimed at reducing overall costs, increasing productivity and accelerating project completion. The redevelopment of Chandigarh Railway Station is a key example of this construction technique. Being undertaken by the Rail Land Development Authority, the Rs 4.62 billion project is designed to expedite construction through prefabricated components and modular design, a first in the railway sector.
The critical groundwork, including foundation and framework, has been completed, with fabrication, erection and slab casting under progress on the Panchkula side station. Further, significant progress has been made in the construction of essential infrastructure such as the air concourse and foot overbridges. The foundation work for the air concourse across different platforms has been completed with fabrication. In addition, an 80 metre long crane has been imported from China at a cost of Rs 110 million for lifting and installing prefabricated materials for the construction of the concourse. The prefabricated construction method is expected to minimise disruptions in railway station operations and ensure consistent quality across modules. The station is likely to serve as a prototype for future railway stations under the Amrit Bharat scheme in India. Another significant example of prefabrication is the use of precast track slabs under the Mumbai Ahmedabad bullet train project. These were lifted through a viaduct and transported to the track laying locations using specially designed wagons.
Airports
Upcoming airports have effectively utilised prefabrication construction techniques, setting new standards for efficiency and durability in airport infrastructure. Recently, Multi Decor India Private Limited partnered with Tata Projects to work on the prefabricated site office at the upcoming Jewar airport, covering an area of around 32,000 square feet. The layout is designed to meet operational requirements and provide a flexible environment that caters to the various demands of airport management.
Moreover, EPACK Prefab has worked as a turnkey pre-engineered building and prefabrication solution provider for the Darbhanga airport project. It has successfully handed over the Darbhanga Airport Phase II arrival area to the airports Authority of India. The area has the capacity to handle around 600 passengers per hour (including peak hours). As of June 2024, the airport has a ground area of around 3,100 square metres, with the new area covering approximately 1,700 square metres.
Rail and hydropower bridges
Prefabricated construction is increasingly being adopted across bridge projects in India. For example, the proposed bowstring railway bridge over the railway line between Udupi and Manipal has deployed prefabrication. Elements such as long beams, arch beams and cross girders have been assembled off-site. Moreover, the worksite has been levelled to enable assembling and dragging of girders to their positions. Prefabricated galvanised steel, weighing around 476 tonnes, is expected to be used for constructing and erecting the bridge. Prefabrication is likely to be carried out through a submerged arc welding process. The project cost is estimated at Rs 90 million.
Another example is the 60 metre steel bridge on the Bajwa-Chhayapuri chord line of Western Railway in Vadodara launched in October 2024. The 645 metric tonne steel bridge, with a height of 12.5 metres and a width of 14.7 metres, was prefabricated at a workshop in Bhachau, Gujarat, and transported to the installation site.
Prefabrication is also being used in hydropower bridges. For instance, Bridge and Roof, an engineering, procurement and construction enterprise, has worked with North East Electric Power Limited to supply the 600 feet-long Chubi bridge (continuous Bailey bridge) over Doyang river, which also includes the Doyang hydroelectric project in Okha, Nagaland. This portable prefabricated truss bridge is the second-largest Bailey bridge
in Asia.
Data centres
The expanding internet and smartphone user base has increased the demand for data centre infrastructure in India. Prefabrication is preferred for data centre construction as it can easily adapt to the ever-changing technological advancements.
Prefabricated buildings can incorporate future expansions, making them ideal for scaling up data centres to fulfil the rising IT load capacity. The modular nature of these structures allows for easy integration of additional capacity, ensuring scalability and operational flexibility. They can also be customised to adhere to industry-specific standards. This ensures consistency and reliability in data centre operations. In addition, prefabricated structures such as insulated panels, efficient lighting systems, heating ventilation and air conditioning systems make the technique energy efficient.
There is significant potential for deploying prefabrication in data centres. For instance, Vertiv, a technology infrastructure solution provider, has launched Vertiv prefabricated modular data centres in India. All subsystems for these data centres have been factory installed and customised to reduce potential for on-site installation delays.
Urban rail
In recent times, there has been an increased integration of tunnel boring machines (TBMs) and prefabricated construction techniques in Indian metros, leading to faster completion of underground metro projects, as seen with the Lucknow metro. Additionally, precast construction was used to expedite the construction of Kanpur metro. The National Capital Region Transport Corporation has also decided to construct a unique precast slab track system for the Delhi-Meerut rapid rail transit corridor. The technology produces high-capacity ballast-less track slabs that have a longer life span and require less maintenance, thereby reducing the overall life cycle cost of the track.
Implementation challenges
One of the major challenges faced in prefabrication is the high initial cost. This is because materials and resources are required to be procured in advance. In addition, transporting prefabricated components may require heavy-duty machinery and equipment, which can be costly and risky. The design, production and implementation of complex plans require skilled and qualified labour, presenting another significant challenge. Other challenges include limited design flexibility and the prerequisite for site preparation in advance.
The way forward
In line with the ambitious national infrastructure pipeline and the government’s aim to transform India into a $5 trillion economy in the years to come, infrastructure development and construction are witnessing increased demand. Prefabrication or precast components can help achieve the timely completion of future projects.
The Government of India has been incentivising the adoption of prefabricated construction across various sectors such as roads and railways. The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) launched the National Highway Precast Concrete Policy in 2022 with the aim of tracking construction progress, reducing dust pollution at worksites and bringing down the overall construction cost. Furthermore, to leverage the benefits of prefabrication in the construction of national highways, expressways and other centrally sponsored road projects, MoRTH has mandated the use of factory-manufactured precast concrete elements in projects within a 100 km radius of a precast factory. The minimum mandatory usage is 25 per cent of the total concrete volume, excluding foundations and substructures of bridges, viaducts and road over bridges.
As per media reports, integrating building information modelling with TBM and prefabrication techniques can reduce project delivery time by around 20 per cent. That said, in the future, with a robust line-up of projects across various infrastructure sectors, prefabrication is expected to play a significant role in construction activities in the coming years.
