The Industry 4.0 era has resulted in several opportunities and challenges for the manufacturing industry and for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME); technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Virtual Reality (VR) or Cloud Computing are changing business structures in profound ways. A literature review shows that most large-sized enterprises have rolled out investment plans, some of which are reviewed during this research and show that Industry 4.0 investments in such companies exceed the turnover of SMEs in all cases (<€50 million), which makes access to those technologies by SMEs very difficult. The research has also identified two gaps: firstly, the recent literature review fails to address the implementation of Industry 4.0 technologies in SMEs from a practical viewpoint; secondly, the few existing roadmaps for the implementation of Industry 4.0 lack a focus on SMEs. Furthermore, SMEs do not have the resources to select suitable technologies or create the right strategy, and they do not have the means to be fully supported by consultancies. To this end, a simple six-step roadmap is proposed that includes real implementations of Industry 4.0 in SMEs. Our results show that implementing Industry 4.0 solutions following the proposed roadmap helps SMEs to select appropriate technologies. In addition, the practical examples shown across this work demonstrate that SMEs can access several Industry 4.0 technologies with low-cost investments.

Industry 4.0 in the contemporary operating context carries important sources of complexity. This context generates both traditional risks and emerging risks that must be managed. The management of these risks includes both industrial risks and occupational risks, since they are heavily interlinked. The human factor can be considered the main link between both types of risks. Thus, understanding risks originating from human errors and organizational weaknesses as causes of accidents and other disruptions in complex systems requires elaborating sophisticated modeling approaches. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to propose an organizational and human performance approach to improve the emerging risk management linked to the complex systems, like as Human‐Machine Interactions (HMI) and Human‐Robot Interaction (HRI). To fulfill this objective, we first introduce the concept of emerging risk linked to human factor. Then, we introduce the concept of emerging risk management in the Industry 4.0 context. Under this complex context, we expose the concept considering the current models of risk management. Finally, we discuss how enhancing human and organizational performance can be achieved through risk management in complex systems linked to Industry 4.0. Therefore, we conclude that while Industry 4.0 brings numerous advantages, it must contend with emerging risks and challenges associated with organizational and human factors. These emerging risks include industrial risks as well as occupational risks. Moreover, the human factor aspect of Industry 4.0 is directly linked to industrial emerging and occupational emerging via context of operations. To cope with these new challenges, it is necessary to develop new approaches. One of such approaches is Complex System Governance. This approach is discussed along with the need for adequate organizational and human performance models dealing with, for example, experience from other domains such as nuclear, space, aviation, and petrochemical.

The size and complexity of industrial chemical plants, together with the nature of the products handled, means that an analysis and control of the risks involved is required. This paper presents a methodology for risk analysis in chemical and allied industries that is based on a combination of HAZard and OPerability analysis (HAZOP) and a quantitative analysis of the most relevant risks through the development of fault trees, fault tree analysis (FTA). Results from FTA allow prioritizing the preventive and corrective measures to minimize the probability of failure. An analysis of a case study is performed; it consists in the terminal for unloading chemical and petroleum products, and the fuel storage facilities of two companies, in the port of Valencia (Spain). HAZOP analysis shows that loading and unloading areas are the most sensitive areas of the plant and where the most significant danger is a fuel spill. FTA analysis indicates that the most likely event is a fuel spill in tank truck loading area. A sensitivity analysis from the FTA results show the importance of the human factor in all sequences of the possible accidents, so it should be mandatory to improve the training of the staff of the plants.

Green Public Procurement (GPP) is defined as a process of contracting products, services, and works with the least possible damage to the environment during their life cycle. In order to improve the knowledge about GPP, a study of the use of environmental tendering criteria in the Spanish public construction sector has been performed. The results of this study show that the use of environmental criteria in Spanish public sector construction procurement is low in comparison to a certain group of countries, known as “Green 7”, in the European Union. Environmental criteria is the fourth criterion in importance, but its weight in the global of the process is much lower than other criteria such as price, memory of the construction process and the delivery time. National administrations use environmental criteria more frequently because they have more resources and staff training about environmental issues. Environmental criteria are more used in the tendering of civil projects and works whose budget exceeds ten million euro due to the environmental impact of these kind and/or size of projects.

The methodology and technology associated with building information modeling (BIM) provide architects, engineers, and historians with concepts and tools that support the development of heritage projects. However, this specific form of BIM orientated towards buildings of patrimonial value—known as historic building information modeling (HBIM)—requires a distinct and additional view, accounting for aspects which are normally not attended to on projects involving new buildings. In an HBIM context, the parametric modeling process, the basis of any BIM procedure, involves the study of shapes, patterns, or standards for the establishment of particular collections of parametric objects, as well as the record of the available technology used to capture digital geometric data. In addition, all the information collected and generated through an HBIM process must be adequately managed, maintained, and archived. In the present study, we intend to list the most recent features of HBIM, based on a bibliographic review, encompassing distinct building situations (preservation, restoration, rehabilitation, and structural assessment); different technical equipment (drones, scanners, and photogrammetry); as well as diverse forms of geometric characterization (patterns, geometric rules, or curve generation) and ways of archiving data (stratigraphy, old drawings folders, or as-built models). With the aim of identifying, as an overview, we have presented the principal modeling strategies, technologic devices, and archive procedures, as a contribution to systematizing and organizing the dispersed practical and theorical studies related with HBIM.