Construction quality information management with blockchains

The information generated from a nonconformance can be used to determine the party responsible for ensuring that quality standards are assured. However, in the construction industry, the absence of a uniform and transparent system for managing quality information undermines the assurance process and may lead to disputes among stakeholders. In addressing this issue, we develop a blockchain-based framework for managing quality information, referred to as Product Organization Process (POP) qualityChain. A Hyperledger-Fabric-based architecture and a series of blockchain solutions (e.g., a POP-model-based quality information structure, a consensus mechanism, smart contracts for processing quality information, authorization sequences, and execution processes) are covered. Finally, we build a prototype system and use a case study to validate our framework. Results show that the proposed framework can decentralize the management of quality information, thereby achieving consistent and secure quality information management. Future work could seek more evidence from practice to further validate our framework.