Conference Track D: The BIM Value Proposition

[Calvin Kam]

Track D focuses on BIM Value Proposition:

Day 1
10:15am Case Studies that Demonstrate Real Project Benefits through BIM [Brittan, Bernstein, Huijbregts, Dietrick]
1:45pm A Technology Roadmap for a Sustainable Capital Projects Industry [Clayton]
3:30pm True BIM: Interoperability Case Studies and Industry Initiatives [Hagan, Onuma, Chaisuparasmikul, Bazjanac]

Day 2
10:15am Deciding When and How to Implement BIM in Your Firm and On Your Projects [Brodkin, Burger, Dietrick]
1:15pm Beyond Collaboration: Setting the Stage for "Integrated BIM" [Vilkner, Harfield, Burns]
2:50pm BIM Talk [Bordenaro]

Bloggers will be reporting live under this discussion thread. Everybody is encouraged to chime in.

[Mike Kenig]

On The Rise: Smart, Integrated Buildings (actual titleof 10:15 track D session)...
some highlights (at least from my perspective)...

Available technologies... added "Buidling Information Networks"... lifecycle through O & M!
Technology - Means - Content - Analysis - Validation (paper vs. models vs. process integration!) - expect validation process to be automated!

Gather information as the building is running.. CISCO (Transforming the Expectation)...
huge % of their space not being used at any moment of time
Productivity (per sf); Operational Excellence (smart buildlings); Experience & New revenue and business models (e.g. video); security & safety (protect assets); environment & sustainability (green thing is NOT to build, but...)... these all lead to real sustainable design

[Calvin Kam]

Day 1--1015am session [Part 1]--Bernstein, Huijbregts, Brittan

the big ideas:
Building Information "Network"
Infrastructure, platform
Change--wiki, "the world is flat" and connected, bandwidth, internet of "things / devices"

Pathway 22 Case Example--$250M mixed-use project in PA, 1-year permitting,
Energy simulation and performance-based design (thermal comfort), life-cycle value, wind analysis, solar study, sun reflectivity analysis, daylighting

[Mike Kenig]

some highlights (continued)...
Cisco... Building Information Network: the platform for transformation -
14 Billion devices connected to the internet!! internet of "things"... not just people... network of information is the "new, fourth utility"... must look at real estate life cycle... BIM an example...

Steve: Case Study: Parkway 22: Performance Based Design
$250M Multi-Family / Mixed Use, Philadelphia... (used Revit)
Visualization and other analyses - helped with neighbors/permitting process - see many interesting examples below (shadows, refectivity, etc.)

Brought CM on board early on!
Measured building performance (energy, other sustainable solutions) as they went
Parking completely concealed
PM website to share information (not sure which?)
Multiple analyses... Visualization most helpful (as always); looked at thermal comfort (multiple variables) for specific rooms - looked at energy recovery and other improvements as they designed!
Wind, Solar, Shadow Analysis (very interesting comparison.. impact of high rise vs. low rise), Sun reflectivity

Mark: Sustainable Buildings... where "BIM" meets "BIN"
previous post occupancy evaluations... design vs. ACTUAL performance... showed signif. variances
actual performance is usually hidden... actually managing performance (OPTIMAL performance!)
leveraging information... integrating it across applications (dashboards)... opens understanding to more people!
Dashboards - graphs, dials, carbon savings, real-time energy management (Enterprise Wide Energy Management solutions / real-time maintenance management, remote monitoring - less manpower!!)
Link facilities (for multi-properties owners)!

Summary: better understand impact of decisions during design! (by using more accurate, real-time information)

[Calvin Kam]

1015am session on Building Information Network (BIN)
[Part 2]--Dietrick, Bernstein

building--static vs. living organism (inter-connected systems)
enterprise-wide dashboard, real-time feedback, real-time energy management
e.g., Boeing reduced energy costs by 20% during peak usage, 50% @ weekend

Integrated Project Delivery (IPD)
collective rewards, incentives, accountability
Convergence

Questions from Audience:
- added premium?
- prolong building life?
- accurate prediction beyond relative comparison?
- buy-in from MEP community?
- design quality and productivity

Calvin's Take:
- from file-centric to network-based
- proactive behavior
- align with past examples and emerging concepts of model server [Norway, Finland], "taloinfo" from [Finland/Granlund, stanford], Decision Dashboard [stanford]

[Brian Kimsey]

True BIM: Interoperability Case Studies and Industry Initiatives

Vladimir Bazjanac is valiantly trying to get everyone on the same track with BIM definitions - at least for this session so that we all have a common frame of reference. He's also quoting Chuck Eastman on what is NOT BIM technology. It's always good to go back to the basics.

[Brian Kimsey]

Vladimar is talking now about proprietary versus open models. The only existing open model as of now is IFC. He's also discussing how downstream applications often transform the BIM data in arbitrary ways, and that this affects the result of downstream analysis tools.

[Brian Kimsey]

During the session Vladimir has been describing the problems of how big and unwieldy BIMs can get. A questioner in the audience asked how you store models if they are that big. The relply kind of missed the mark though. The models themselves are not big files in terms of storage.

A second questioner is now clearing this up - that the collective Autocad files on a job are bigger than a BIM of the same project would be. The issue is that the Windows-based BIM programs just cannot process models that are excessively large. 300MB or so can cause problems in Revit, but that size model would fit several times on an average thumb drive!

[Brian Kimsey]

Kimon Onuma is now talking about his definition of BIM ("BIM is not a software"), and about BIM Storm. He states that there is an exponential increase in value of BIM based on the number of users who can access it.

Linking BIM and GIS (also discussed this morning) - GSA has been working with Onuma on this.
We'll all get to participate in a Boston BIM storm tomorrow, which is already ongoing.

[Brian Kimsey]

Mr. Chaisuparasmikul is readying his presentation.... At a technology conference it is always disheartening to see that we can't always even get get Powerpoint to work!

Kimon Onuma is doing a good job winging it, filling in with Q&A. The projector is working again!

A switcheroo - Steven Hagan is going next, with a presentation of BIM and stellar architecture award winners. In previous years the awards have gone to an engineering firm (Arup) and a contractor (Mortensen). Finally an architect won last year! It is a good prelude to the 2008 BIM awards tomorrow night.

[Brian Frels / RTKL]

3:30 - 5:00
True BIM: Interoperability Case Studies and Industry initiatives
1. BIM, Interoperability and Sustainability
2. Google Your BIM
3. Integrated Information Model and Software Interoperability to Improve Sustainable Design Process
4. True BIM

First Up: Dr. Vladimir Bazjanac
Definitions of BIM are varied. Everyone has his or her own opinions

Dr Bazjanac highlights the important terms in the following definitions.

Wikipedia - The building information model is a set of information generated and maintained throughout the lifecycle of a building. Building information modeling is the process of generating and managing a building information model

NBIMS-Bim is intended to be an open standards base repository of information for the facility owner oper to use and maintain throughout the life-cycle of a facility

IAI - Nordic chapter BIM is an object oriented aec specific digital representation of a building to facilitate data exchange and interoperability of information in digital format

BIM Handbook (Eastman et al. 2008) is recommended.

This book also has its own definition of what is BIM but perhaps more importantly what is NOT BIM.
No 3d data and no object attributes
Models with no support behavior
Models that are composed of multiple 2d cad references
Models that allow changes in one view but not another

What Essentially is BIM?
Instance of a data model
Populated with data from a particular building
Not every cell has to be populated?

Authoring software populates BIM – BIM Utility may use info and transfer it back into BIM (data transformation)

Views of a data Model
-model can become enormously large – to big for one model. Views of the data model – views will overlap in some areas of the model. The same data can be interpreted differently.


BIM Data Transformation
-Import/export of data by downstream software almost always necessitates transformation of data (data set reduction/simplification, data translation and interpretation)

Arbitrary, ad-hoc, subjective and ill-informed data transformation are some of the main reasons why simulation and analysis results are unreliable and not reproducible

Firm transformation rules, embedded in model view definitions in the software

Current Status of BIM software
Most BIM software currently falls way short of end users expectations
-Limited functionality
-Immature state of development
-Full of bugs
-Not robust

Industry does not spend money on software…we must be willing to spend more on software in order for venders to develop the software further.

Process which is facilitated by BIM….Maximum effort put into Design.

Kimon Onuma
Notes:
BIM is not a software
-It is not one BIM
-Many BIMS – shared – with ownership for parts
BIM must be democratic – for all the people
Public owns part of it too – fire department etc
BIM how power to reduce global warming
Expedia – don’t have to wait 2 weeks for an answer
Open standards has the potential…culture and industry must change

BIM Storm – global real-time multi user charette model server. Its like doing expedia in excel.

Linked to a lot of other tools….excel
The value of BIM increase exponentially as the number of users increases
Facebook generation will not accept the current methodologies

If you don’t know where you building is how can you talk about sustainability

Its not one tool…the internet is not one tool.

The currency of the information age is information

We are in the information age

What BIM platform should we use?
We all like simple decisions…like sticking to a brand

Not just geometry…BIM must have data

If you put your design in proprietary formats that no one can read then your information isn’t worth anything.

Comments:
Mr. Onuma has some really exciting concepts and ideas for the Information age. I can’t wait to see his full presentation tomorrow at 8:30.

Questions:
Vladimier: The future of this industry is in Vir

[Brian Frels / RTKL]

We are currently having technical difficulties with Pongsak Chaisuparasmikul's presentation. It’s amazing that these things happen all the time. Even in a group of highly competent technical people there are always glitches. Have you ever been to a convention that didn't have these problems. I think this is a relevant topic for discussion as this convention focuses on increasing our dependence on technology.

[Brian Kimsey]

Is this just now being announced? The award winner to be presented tomorrow night is the Wayne L. Morse U.S. Courthouse in Eugene Oregon - a GSA project. A beautiful building, done in Triforma, but it really started out more as a geometry model than a true BIM.

It was a great success story for team work though, and how BIM can pop up from the least expected team members - the plumbing contractor in this case!