Building Information Models Using a Shared Knowledge Resource to Map a Facility’s Life Cycle
by Robert Bradford and Fred Terry
One can’t attend an engineering conference or pick up an industry trade magazine without hearing about the virtues of Building Information Models (BIM).
Progressive and technologically sophisticated engineering companies have been delivering BIM data to clients for many years, but the BIM moniker is only starting to be applied to the design, construction, and operations and maintenance (O&M) data that has been created and collected on a regular basis.
BIM was created to define a specific product feature but has expanded to encompass all data in a facility and all of the disciplines involved in maintaining the facility.
BIM was first defined in 2002 by Autodesk to help describe and differentiate its Building Solutions software from two- and three-dimensional computer aided design (CAD) applications. The notion that CAD data could be linked with attribute data to add value and aid in downstream activities wasn’t new. Geographic information systems seek to accomplish the same goal: model the earth and the relationships inherent in mapable features. BIM simply applied this concept within the walls of a building and included architectural, structural, mechanical and electrical features. The attribute data may also include spatial, financial and O&M data that, taken together, may describe the life cycle of the facility.
As defined by the National Institute for Building Sciences (NIBS), a BIM is a digital representation of physical and functional characteristics of a facility. As such it serves as a shared knowledge resource for information about a facility forming a reliable basis for decisions during its life cycle from earliest conception to demolition. A basic premise of BIM is collaboration by different stakeholders at different phases of the life cycle of a facility to insert, extract, update or modify information in the BIM process to support and reflect the roles of that stakeholder.
BIM can take on different meanings depending on the point of view of the various stakeholders. To the design team, it represents the integration of technology and creativity to satisfy the requirements the team must meet to successfully execute the project. To the developer and the investor, the model can be used to fully illustrate the design and provide a decision support mechanism before the first spade of earth has been turned. To the owner, the model is the foundation for activities and analysis that support the intended and actual function of the facility. The BIM provides the means for data collection and sustainment needed to drive business processes that may even fall outside the traditional facility life cycle.
Currently, true enterprise convergence and interoperability using BIM is limited due to lack of support for a relational database structure to store the spatial and attribute data that is inherent to BIMs. Without a foundational database, the organization wishing to incorporate true BIM data with disparate systems located throughout the enterprise must tolerate import/export routines that add a duplicative dimension to data management.
At a recent BIM symposium a question was asked concerning this lack of support for databases. The unified answer that was offered stated the BIM market is not mature enough to justify the software development effort needed to add this functionality. Adding database functionality would allow the integration of standalone CAD BIMs with these other systems in the building to create a true BIM, to move from three-dimensional draw-ings to a building knowledge base. In a life cycle BIM, a pump in the CAD drawings could be linked to its commissioning information in the computer-aided facility management (CAFM) system, its re- placement information and maintenance history in the computerized maintenance management system (CMMS), as well as operational manuals in the document management system. In turn, this data could then be used to generate financials and predictive maintenance models for the capital improvement plan. This kind of BIM takes advantage of all enterprise information, allowing the building owner to identify and implement process improvements and cost saving measures.
Robert Bradford is Manager, Facility & Geospatial Intelligence, Burns & McDonnell.
P | 816.822.3895
E | rbradford@burnsmcd.com
Fred Terry is Manager, System Integration Services, Burns & McDonnell.
P | 816.822.4293
E | fterry@burnsmcd.com