Civil engineers design and build a wide range of infrastructure projects, including buildings, harbors, dams, reservoirs, power stations, water supply and waste disposal systems, airports, tunnels, highways, bridges, railroads, and pipelines. Sustainable infrastructure development and management require knowledge and skills in a wide range of disciplines, including management science, economics, statistics, law, computer science, engineering and project management. Being interdisciplinary, the Project Management and Financial Engineering (PMFE) division actively develops such knowledge and skills and promotes their application in infrastructure development and management for improved quality, efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Currently, the research of the PMFE division is focusing on the following areas:

 

Web-based decision tools and computer simulation techniques to support project/construction management

Project representation and process modeling; selection of construction methods and technologies; lean construction; value engineering; theory of inventive problem solving; constructability/maintainability; life cycle cost analysis; flexible structure coding and mapping; integration of project planning, scheduling, cost estimating and project control.

 

Project delivery systems

Contracting framework and contract conditions; tendering procedures, prequalification, and tender evaluation criteria and methods; EPC projects; construction contracts; supply and service contracts; concession contracts; BOT-type projects; public-private partnerships; partnering and strategic alliances; project supply chain management; best value/performance based contracting; relational contracting; claims analysis and quantification; change order management; alternative dispute resolution.

 

Infrastructure project financing and international financial markets

Financial instruments; financial innovations in international infrastructure markets; off-balance sheet transactions; asset and liability management; limited-recourse structures; project financing; project appraisal; risk assessment and management; hedging strategies; financial structuring, modeling and evaluation.

 

Mathematic and simulation modeling

Automated data acquisition; stochastic modeling and programming; probabilistic models; decision analysis; heuristic techniques; Markov decision process; queuing theory; inventory theory; statistical and forecasting techniques; parametric and nonparametric data-analytic techniques; utility theory; genetic algorithms; analytic hierarchy process; fuzzy logic; artificial neural networks; hybrid systems; Monte Carlo and other simulation techniques.

 

Faculty

Prof. Jack C.P. CHENG: Construction IT and knowledge management, building information modeling (BIM),Carbon footprint measurement and auditing, green buildings and sustainable constructionl, construction supply chain management, service computing and data mining in construction, Internet of Things (IoT) and smart cities.

 

Prof. Xueqing ZHANG: Project management and financial engineering; sustainable development; infrastructure asset management; management information system; computer simulation.