Exploring the risk propagation mechanisms of supply chain for prefabricated building projects

Prefabricated building (PB) is an innovative construction method with significant advantages in environmental protection, energy saving, productivity increase, and quality improvement. The complexity of the prefabricated building project supply chain (PBPSC) also induces risks leading to the failure of PBP. Existing researches consider risks isolated and ignores the interactions between stakeholders of PBPSC that can lead to risk propagation and management failures. This study integrated epidemic models with complex networks to explore risk propagation mechanisms in PBPSC. The hierarchical structure of PBPSC was transited into a complex network for analyzing the features of the risk propagation process and the risk propagation capacity of initial infection nodes. The analysis results indicated that risk propagation and risk recovery were medium and often overlooked, which caused risk propagation in PBPSC. When major PBP contractors and construction enterprises were affected by risks, risk propagation was more likely to occur in PBPSC. This study was a meaningful attempt to analyze the risk propagation mechanisms from the perspective of complex networks in PBPSC. Based on the analysis results, this study revealed the critical risks and propagation characteristics of PBPSC for exploring the risk propagation mechanisms and response strategies to improve the risk response capacity of PBPSC.