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Editorial - Case studies of bim in use

Authors:
Thomas Olofsson at Luleå University of Technology
Thomas Olofsson
Ghang Lee at Yonsei University
Ghang Lee
Charles M. Eastman at Georgia Institute of Technology
Charles M. Eastman
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EDITORIAL - CASE STUDIES OF BIM IN USE
PUBLISHED: June 2008
GUEST EDITORS: Thomas Olofsson, Ghang Lee and Charles Eastman
Thomas Olofsson
Professor and head of Construction Engineering
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Luleå University of Technology, Luleå, Sweden
email: thomas.olofsson@ltu.se
Ghang Lee
Assistant Professor
Department of Architectural Engineering
Yonsei University Seoul 120-749, Korea
email: glee@yonsei.ac.kr
Charles Eastman
Professor in the Colleges of Architecture and Computing,
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta Georgia, USA
email: Charles.Eastman@coa.gatech.edu
EDITORIAL
The use of information-rich parametric modeling 3D CAD models is increasing in the AEC industry. With this
special issue we want to collect and share the benefits and challenges of using Building Information Modelling
(BIM) for stakeholders in the building process, i.e. owners, architects, contractors, suppliers and others. Case
studies of BIM applications are currently being presented in conferences and workshops worldwide. An example
of such an initiative is the International Alliance of Interoperability initiated Building Smart forum for the
industry and governments to identify, test, review, recommend and implement smart ways to deliver quality
buildings and services to the facility owners using BIM technology. Another example is the annual award by the
American Institute of Architects for projects that have used integrated and interoperable building information
models.
The objectives of this special issue are as follows:
• To report the use, benefits and challenges of BIM technology in architecture, construction and engineering
projects in quantitative figures.
• To share views on how costs and benefits (both hard and soft values) of BIM can be identified and
measured/estimated in AEC projects.
• To identify the technical issues such as interoperability, data management etc. as well as the changes in
organisations and business practices needed for the successful implementation of BIM models and tools in
AEC projects.
The Manning and Messner paper BIM Case Studies in BIM Implementation for Programming of Healthcare
Facilities investigates the benefits of using BIM in the early conceptual stage. Primary benefits that were
identified are (1) rapid visualization, (2) better decision support upstream in the project development process, (3)
rapid and accurate updating of changes, (4) reduction of man-hours required to establish reliable space programs
(5) increased communication across the total project development team (users, designers, capital allocation
decision makers, contracting entities, and contractors), and (6) increased confidence in completeness of scope.
Ku, Pollalsis, Fischer and Sheldon discuss how the 3D Model-Based Collaboration in Design Development and
Construction of Complex Shaped Buildings can be successfully implemented. The findings from three case
studies suggest that collaboration methods on 3D models differ with the architects’ approaches to geometry
control.
ITcon Vol. 13 (2008), Olofsson et al, pg. 244
The Leicht’s and Messner’s paper, Moving toward an ‘Intelligent’ Shop Modeling, focuses on the value and
challenges of implementing BIM for trade shop drawings in an ongoing case study project. The process used by
the construction manager to develop the specialty contractor packages, the breakdown of the 3D and BIM
requirements by specialty contractor, the steps to begin and to carry out coordination are discussed. One of the
areas found to be of the most value so far was the planning and transparency of the process.
The four detailed Case Studies of BIM Adoption for Precast Concrete Design by Mid-Sized Structural
Engineering Firms, reported by Kaner, Sacks, Kassian & Quitt shed light on the obstacles in implementation, the
achievements and disappointments, and the changes in workflow and personnel that the firms have experienced.
The results reveal clear improvements in engineering design quality, in terms of error-free drawings, and steadily
increasing improvement in labour productivity. They conclude, that “progress in adopting BIM is slow but
certain”.
Khanzode’s, Fischer’s and Reed’s paper discusses the Benefits and Lessons Learned of Implementing Building
VDC Technologies for Coordination of MEP Systems on a Large Healthcare Project. The benefits include labor
savings, 100% pre-fabrication for the plumbing contractor, only one recorded injury throughout the installation
of MEP systems, less than 0.2% rework, zero conflicts in the field installation of the systems and only a handful
of RFI for the coordination of the MEP systems, and 6 months’ savings on the schedule and about $9M savings
in cost for the overall project. The lessons the team learned include the level and type of details team members
need to include to achieve benefits from the use of BIM / VDC tools for the coordination of MEP systems.
Dehlin’s and Olofsson’s paper, an Evaluation Model for ICT Investments in Construction Projects, proposes a
new project-oriented evaluation model of ICT investments. The models’ application is illustrated using a case
study project. The shift in focus from costs/benefits for the individual stakeholders to costs/benefits for the
project gives a momentum to optimize the use of a new ICT tools in construction. This will surely affect the
processes and the contractual environment in the project, since it has to support sharing of information and
achieved benefits and the costs of the investment in the project.
None of the presented case studies on the use of BIM above have presented any interoperability issues using the
IFC standard. In the last paper, Interoperability in Practice: Geometric Data Exchange using the IFC Standard,
Pazlar and Turk report on tests performed with file based geometry exchange between different CAD software
applications. The test examples revealed several cases of information distortion and/or information loss both on
the entity and attribute level. Unsatisfying model handling proved to be characteristic of all the tested exchange
scenarios. The authors’ conclusion is that in the future more effort should be put into the IFC interface
development.
To summarize; the benefits of using of BIM have been demonstrated in several case studies of real construction
projects. Benefits can be found in all phases in the building project ranging from the conceptual design to the
realization of the building. It also seems that most stakeholders in the building process benefits from the use of
BIM, but maybe the greatest beneficiary is the client. Therefore investments in BIM technology should be
evaluated on the project level, sharing the costs and benefits between all stakeholders.
Case study results in the application of the IFC standard to real projects are largely lacking. Technical
comparisons, such as that by Pazlar and Turk, show the significant weaknesses that currently exist. Comparisons
with other data exchange approaches are also generally lacking, as are comparisons with proprietary interfaces.
These results indicate that no exchange approach is currently satisfactory and that interoperability is a major
limitation in the advance of BIM.
ITcon Vol. 13 (2008), Olofsson et al, pg. 245
... Several case studies attest to the benefits of BIM. Case Studies of BIM in use were demonstrated in Precast Concrete Design by four Structural Engineering Firms that experienced an improvement in engineering design quality and labour productivity (Olofsson et al, 2008). Another case study of a large healthcare project showed the benefits of complete pre-fabrication in plumbing works, less than 0.2% rework, zero design conflicts, six months' time savings, and a $9M savings in overall project cost (Olofsson et al, 2008). ...
... Case Studies of BIM in use were demonstrated in Precast Concrete Design by four Structural Engineering Firms that experienced an improvement in engineering design quality and labour productivity (Olofsson et al, 2008). Another case study of a large healthcare project showed the benefits of complete pre-fabrication in plumbing works, less than 0.2% rework, zero design conflicts, six months' time savings, and a $9M savings in overall project cost (Olofsson et al, 2008). ...
Procurement Routes, Supply Chain Management and Building Information Modelling: A Review of Trends and Impacts on the Construction Industry
Article
Full-text available
  • Apr 2023
It has been argued that the construction industry is distinct from other industries and must therefore find solutions that align with its peculiarities. Over the last three decades, several reports, primarily Latham (1994) and Egan (1998) have spotlighted systemic issues underlying the construction industry. The construction industry is highly fragmented evidenced by a high level of subcontracting and a lack of integration within supply chains. Poor information management has also been a common thread on most construction projects. The adversarial culture of project stakeholders and low productivity has been repeatedly discussed in the literature. Particularly, in the 1990's discussions on poor information management, loosely coupled supply chains, and lack of collaboration took center stage. Addressing these issues, given the transformational changes in other industries, has resulted in the drive by the construction industry to proffer alternative methods of procurement and supply chain management centered on Building Information Modelling. This report compares the advantages and disadvantages of the different procurement methods available to construction projects , examines the impact of Building Information Modelling on procurement methods, and also outlines the trends in digitalisation within the built environment and its implications for procurement.
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... However, because IFC contains entity and relationship definitions of various AEC subdomains, the schema defined by IFC is complex and redundant [9], which causes unacceptable mismatch and reliability problems [9,28]. Lack of formal logic rigidness in IFC [9] also makes mapping of BIM elements to IFC types arbitrary and susceptible to misclassifications [20]. ...
... This poses a challenge to the reuse of BIM models in downstream tasks. Semantic enrichment techniques [1,2,7,20,23,25,28,29,30,32,37] solve the interoperability problem by exploiting existing numeric, geometric, or relational information in the model to infer new semantic information. ...
A Geometric-Relational Deep Learning Framework for BIM Object Classification
Preprint
  • Dec 2022
Interoperability issue is a significant problem in Building Information Modeling (BIM). Object type, as a kind of critical semantic information needed in multiple BIM applications like scan-to-BIM and code compliance checking, also suffers when exchanging BIM data or creating models using software of other domains. It can be supplemented using deep learning. Current deep learning methods mainly learn from the shape information of BIM objects for classification, leaving relational information inherent in the BIM context unused. To address this issue, we introduce a two-branch geometric-relational deep learning framework. It boosts previous geometric classification methods with relational information. We also present a BIM object dataset IFCNet++, which contains both geometric and relational information about the objects. Experiments show that our framework can be flexibly adapted to different geometric methods. And relational features do act as a bonus to general geometric learning methods, obviously improving their classification performance, thus reducing the manual labor of checking models and improving the practical value of enriched BIM models.
View
... Studies on BIM utilisation or application in construction projects are not quite so various as the ones on BIM adoption in the construction industry (Olatunji, 2011;Cao et al., 2014;Manning and Messner, 2008;Olofsson et al., 2008;Cao et al., 2015;Kerosuo et al., 2015). This is an indication that the applications of the capacities and possibilities of BIM are as yet advancing, and they will keep on developing. ...
If you cannot fly, then run: a model of BIM implementation taxonomies and thresholds
Article
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  • Jan 2023
  • Int J Inform Tech Manag
The barriers to BIM adoption are various and overpowering. These barriers should be continuously defeated through a recursive BIM implementation strategy and evaluation. The point of this paper is to recognise the key reduction indicators for tracking BIM adoption barriers and lay out whether the key reduction indicators will give a model of BIM implementation taxonomies and thresholds for assessing BIM implementation performance. Meta-analysis methodology was utilised to synthesise the diverse findings. These key reduction indicators were sorted into three BIM implementation thresholds: BIM advanced industry, BIM emerging industry, and BIM frontier industry. It was observed that BIM implementation taxonomies have various levels of the implementation plan, levels of market adequacy, and levels of goals. The study inferred that the proposed model will assist with smoothing out the necessities and instruct on the BIM implementation needs concerning different construction industries, most especially the developing construction industries.
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... Building Information Modeling (BIM) is the process of creating an accurate, intelligent and computable three-dimensional (3D) virtual model of a building (Olofsson, Lee and Eastman 2008). It has been extensively used during the past two decades for product family design to optimize design, minimize production waste, manage supply chain, standardize components of products, and manage product changes and options (Jian, et al. 2014). ...
Integrating Energy Efficiency Strategies with Industrialized Construction for our Clean Energy Future
Conference Paper
Full-text available
  • Sep 2020
NREL’s Industrialized Construction Innovation Team has developed an ambitious plan to accelerate the integration of energy efficiency (EE) strategies with Industrialized Construction (IC). The United States (U.S.) construction industry is beginning to use IC methods to build multifamily apartment buildings to address affordability and labor shortages. Apart from reducing cost of construction and delivery times, the IC method of permanent modular construction has the potential to facilitate the integration of a wide range of EE strategies and advanced controls into such buildings. While there may be unintended EE benefits to IC such as a tighter envelope due to higher construction quality, the process has not been leveraged specifically to enhance EE. NREL aims to claim this missed opportunity and integrate IC benefits with EE as well as advanced controls, distributed energy resources, and grid-friendly design strategies. The paper proposes an ‘IC Assessment Framework’ to achieve affordable zero-energy modular multifamily buildings. Through the selection criteria of Design for Manufacturing and Assembly, the framework aims to distill a broad range of proven EE strategies for site-built into a set of strategies that qualify as easy to integrate for off-site. The output is a Factory Information Model (FIM) that represents a process-based digital twin to enable advanced time-and-motion study, plugs into open source building energy modeling platform (EnergyPlus), and serves as a vital tool facilitating wider adoption of EE integration. Conclusively, the paper delineates next steps for upcoming pilots with NREL’s IC partners towards developing a transformational pathway for our Clean Energy Future.
View
... anging from the conceptual design to the realization of the building. It also seems that most stakeholders in the building process benefits from the use of BIM, but maybe the greatest beneficiary is the client. Therefore, investments in BIM technology should be evaluated on the project level, sharing the costs and benefits between all stakeholders (Olofsson et. al, 2008) BIM also has a considerable functional extension which performs not in BIM models, but via interoperability with other applications and platforms. The simulation tools are the most common applications of BIM extensions in new projects and various workflows exist, such as energy performance, crowd simulation, environment analysis and fir ...
Report Group 12
Technical Report
Full-text available
  • Jul 2020
The most recent technological development in the construction industry is the concept called Building Information Modelling (BIM). In this project, knowledge of this concept has been exercised through the creation of a 3D and 4D Building Information model of the proposed High Court complex in Lagos, Nigeria using BIM tools. A simple BIM execution plan was created with a detailed structure of the process map, exchange requirements and technical infrastructure used to achieve this task. The parametric 3D model of the building was created using BIM authoring tool Revit. Additional families were created in Revit to parametrically model certain components of the building. Dynamo scripts that allows for visual interaction with the Revit model for changing parametric values in the Revit model were also created. In order to extend the functionality of visual programming in Dynamo, python program elements were used. After creating the 3D model, it was exported as Industry Foundation Class (IFC) to view the detailed information in the individual sections of the building. The exported model was used to design a 4D process animation based on a created schedule within the tool DesiteMD. In addition, a colour scheme that displays the room occupancy was displayed. The entire project was completed using classroom tutorial and sourced information from the internet. The outcome of the study revealed the essence of BIM and the common problems encountered while making a BIM project and how they can be overcome. It is concluded that although BIM is based on digital building models that store geometric and semantic information of a building, it is also a collaborative working method among the professionals involved in the construction(processes).
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... BIM creates a product model based on collective efforts of a coordinated working process using responsive technology which makes it a collaborative e-working environment by nature. Olofsson, et al. (2008) stated that the major key advantages of BIM are that allow the development of detailed information and analysis at a very early stage of the building process to improve decision making and reduce cross-discipline changes. The primary benefits of early stage engagement of BIM that can be identified are "(1) rapid visualization, (2) better decision support upstream in the project development process, (3) rapid and accurate updating of changes, (4) reduction of labor required to establish reliable space programs, (5) increased communication across the life cycle, and (6) increased confidence in completeness of scope" (Manning and Messner, 2008). ...
Education Needs to Support Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Collaboration Using Building Information Modeling
Article
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  • Dec 2019
Projects in the construction industry involve multidisciplinary collaboration between the disciplines of architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC), and others. Conventionally, the collaboration between these disciplines relied on the recurrent exchange of relevant drawings and documents. Building information modeling (BIM) as a model-based process has given AEC professionals the tools to more efficiently plan, design, construct, and manage buildings and infrastructure. Yet the AEC industry has been reluctant in fully adopting the BIM as a single standard. This study explores and identifies the bottlenecks in adopting BIM as a single product lifecycle standard in the construction industry and advise on educating new engineers to become the generation to use a virtual collaborative working space covering the entire building lifecycle. Two conducted surveys targeting the AEC academia and industry revealed the needs for multilevel cross-disciplinary interactive collaborative BIM process modeling, and skilled workforce to increase the graduates’ marketability and BIM adaptability. It is concluded that the new age collaborative culture requires new generation of AEC players that are enabled to work on a shared virtual product model supported by proactive BIM skills learned through undergraduate programs.
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... 2.2 Impacts of BIM on architectural design process Among the general set of limitations of BIM implementation in AEC industry, the most apparent challenges have been declared as the increase of cost and requirements in terms of software and hardware, change in organizational culture and lack of BIM trained professionals (Khemlani, 2006;Riese and Peake, 2007;Olofsson et al., 2008;Khanzode et al., 2008;Manning and Messner, 2008). According to a report for Autodesk (Erin, 2016), firms were unwilling to invest in BIM setup due to difficulty in calculating costs of investment and return on investment (ROI). ...
A roadmap for BIM adoption and implementation in developing countries: the Pakistan case
Article
Full-text available
  • Sep 2019
Purpose Digital media is reshaping architectural design by introducing new tools, methods and workflows. Among various AEC tools, Building Information Modeling (BIM) has gained popularity due to its collaboration platform enabling cross-disciplinary teamwork during whole life cycle of buildings. BIM has further transformed culture and processes associated with design, construction and operation of buildings, hence triggering new building regulations in developed countries. However, in developing countries, BIM implementation is facing several barriers, such as lack of investment in technology and training, hesitation in quitting traditional tools and practices, etc. The purpose of this paper is to highlight potentials of BIM for developing countries, which are in need of more sustainable policies for enhancing their economic and environmental performances. Design/methodology/approach Throughout the text, a literature review on BIM including its dimensions and benefits, impacts on architectural design and adoption in global and local contexts is provided. In case study, surveys and structured interviews are conducted with BIM user and non-BIM user architects throughout Pakistan. Beyond 2D/3D modeling, the use of BIM applications for sustainable design process such as scheduling (4D), cost estimation (5D), performance analysis and facilities management (6D) is investigated. Findings Using analytical tools of an online surveying tool and SPSS statistical software, barriers and motivations for BIM implementation in Pakistan are determined. Strategies for further BIM adoption and implementation via “education and training institutions” and “supporting organizations and institutions” are defined. Originality/value As a developing country, Pakistan shall be moving the barriers for the spread of BIM technology. Recent research covered the entire AEC sector (Masood et al. , 2014; Sohu et al. , 2017; Ali et al. , 2018), yet this paper focuses specifically on architectural design and practice field. In order to find out experiences and expectations about BIM technology in the architecture sector, professionals are surveyed and four chief architects are interviewed. How far have Pakistani architects adopted BIM? For which project types and scales is BIM more serviceable for them? Which BIM applications are they implementing to overcome the limitations in their professional practice? In Pakistan, where sustainability, in terms of scheduling, cost estimation, performance analysis and facilities management, is an indispensible measure for local practices, has implementation of BIM technology achieved sustainability in architectural design process? What are the motivations of Pakistani architects for becoming BIM users in future?
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A Geometric-Relational Deep Learning Framework for BIM Object Classification
Chapter
  • Feb 2023
  • Lect Notes Comput Sci
Interoperability issue is a significant problem in Building Information Modeling (BIM). Object type, as a kind of critical semantic information needed in multiple BIM applications like scan-to-BIM and code compliance checking, also suffers when exchanging BIM data or creating models using software of other domains. It can be supplemented using deep learning. Current deep learning methods mainly learn from the shape information of BIM objects for classification, leaving relational information inherent in the BIM context unused. To address this issue, we introduce a two-branch geometric-relational deep learning framework. It boosts previous geometric classification methods with relational information. We also present a BIM object dataset—IFCNet++, which contains both geometric and relational information about the objects. Experiments show that our framework can be flexibly adapted to different geometric methods and relational features do act as a bonus to general geometric learning methods, obviously improving their classification performance, thus reducing the manual labor of checking models and improving the practical value of enriched BIM models.
View
View
Exploring the paradox of low BIM adoption in the built environment
Conference Paper
Full-text available
  • Nov 2021
Building Information Modelling (BIM) is an ICT application of tools and processes. There is a limited understanding of the real root causes of challenges in implementation among practitioners. As part of an ongoing action research project in a Norwegian municipality, we held a series of focus group sessions with technology users. We explored the reasons for the slow uptake of BIM in the context of the need for information management. We find limited engagement in information management processes necessary for successful application of BIM. However, we find great interest in achieving more sustainable outcomes in the municipality. We argue a possible realignment of the purported benefits of BIM towards emerging sustainable development goals in the municipality. The relevancy of this article is to find leads to actionable solutions to the slow digital transformation in the built environment. We find it paradoxical that increased BIM adoption might be achieved by not focusing on BIM at all, but by focusing on achieving sustainable outcomes, for which both BIM and information management is necessary.
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