Search

The emergence of Digital Twin (DT) technology presents unique opportunities for society by facilitating real-time data transfer from the physical environment to its digital counterpart. Although progress has been made in various industry sectors such as aerospace, the Architecture, Engineering, Construction, and Operation (AECO) sector still requires further advancements, like the adoption of these technologies over traditional approaches. The use of these technologies should become standard practice rather than an advanced operation. This paper aims to address the existing gap by presenting a comprehensive framework that integrates technologies and concepts derived from purpose-driven case studies and research studies across different industries. The framework is designed to provide best practices for the AECO sector. Moreover, it aims to underscores the potential of DT for optimization through overseeing and digital management of the built environment across the entire life cycle of facilities, encompassing design, construction, operation, and maintenance. It is based on an extensive literature review and presents a holistic approach to outlining the roles of Building Information Modelling (BIM), Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Internet of Things (IoT), and other key enablers within the DT environment. These digital tools facilitating the simultaneous evaluation of associated benefits, such as resource savings and future prospects, like monitoring project sustainability objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the transition towards a circular economy (CE) being a significant element in achieving the decarbonisation of the built environment, a clear and common pathway to applying CE principles to building design is still lacking in both industry practice and academia. The integration of Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has the potential to enable the identification of feasible pathways to increase circularity. This study aims to investigate its practical use to facilitate the application of circular economy principles at the early stage of building design via using LCA-based BIM plugins. Within this aim, the paper centres on a co-production approach and presents a gap analysis by identifying gaps in knowledge and implementation as well as addressing the pressing needs of the current practice in the UK. A series of semi-structured interviews with expert practitioners in the field were conducted for data collection, contributing to the following phases of the co-production by allowing for an in-depth investigation and reflection of the practice. The findings have revealed that: (a) there is still an insufficient level of contextual awareness and readiness in the implementation of CE principles in the built environment and LCA understanding and (b) the adoption of BIM at the early stages of building design is still limited in the current practice; BIM models with sufficient level of data details and quality to enable circularity assessment are rarely produced. Thus, the paper highlights the need for enabling mechanisms, including the introduction of legislative instruments, the involvement and commitment of the industry and key stakeholders, the support for training and skills improvement, and the establishment of effective communication and implementation process management frameworks. Future research agenda points to the need of formulation of a BIM protocol to enable integration of BIM and LCA to promote CE principles in the building design process. [Display omitted] • Co-production is a promising approach to capture and respond to the industry needs. • Lack of seamless integration between BIM and LCA tools. • Insufficient understanding of how to apply CE principles in the building design. • Lack of systematic guidance and standardised process to implement BIM and LCA integration. • A tailored BIM protocol needed for applying LCA from a CE perspective in the building design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the gaining popularity and proliferation of building information modeling (BIM) techniques, a growing demand emerges for accurate, up-to-date and semantically-enriched digital representations of built environments. In this regard, current mobile indoor mapping systems like the Microsoft HoloLens or Matterport allow to efficiently acquire triangle meshes of indoor building environments. However, manually reconstructing digital models of building interiors on the basis of these triangle meshes is a cumbersome and time-consuming task. Consequently, in this work, we propose a fully automatic, voxel-based indoor reconstruction approach to derive semantically-enriched and geometrically completed indoor models in voxel representation from unstructured triangle meshes. The presented approach does not require room surfaces such as walls, ceilings or floors to be planar or aligned with the coordinate axes. Furthermore, it does not rely on a clear vertical subdivision in distinct floor levels and even allows for slanted floors such as ramps or stair flights. It thus can also be applied to challenging indoor environments featuring curved room surfaces and complex vertical room layouts. The proposed approach labels voxels as 'Ceiling', 'Floor', 'Wall', 'Wall Opening', 'Interior Object' and 'Empty Interior'. Room surfaces are geometrically completed in case of holes in the input triangle meshes caused by occlusion or incomplete mapping. Furthermore, the derived interior space is partitioned into rooms and connecting transition spaces. To demonstrate the performance of our approach, we conduct a thorough quantitative evaluation on four labeled benchmark datasets. To this aim, we present a novel and adequate, automatic evaluation method. The four datasets have been acquired with the Microsoft HoloLens and are available along with the manually modeled ground truth. We also release the code of our implementation of the voxel-based indoor reconstruction approach presented in this paper as well as the code for the automated evaluation against the ground truth data at https://github.com/huepat/voxir. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Building information modelling (BIM) and geographical information systems (GIS) provide digital representation of architectural and environmental entities. BIM focuses on micro-level representation of buildings themselves, and GIS provide macro-level representation of the external environments of buildings. Moreover, their combination can establish a comprehensive view of a built environment based on data integrated, which underpins the development and transition of the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industries in the digital era. This paper gives a comprehensive review on BIM-GIS integration in sustainable built environments in order to analyse the status quo and practical applications from four viewpoints: technologies for data integration, applications in the life cycle of AEC projects, building energy management, and urban governance. Three typical modes of BIM-GIS integration, namely, "BIM leads and GIS supports", "GIS leads and BIM supports", and "BIM and GIS are equally involved", are categorised based on the different dominant positions of the two technologies. Furthermore, the research trends and future directions for the applications of BIM-GIS integration are discussed. Specifically, we underline that semantic models and third-party integration platforms should be optimised technically, and information about the whole process of AEC projects needs to be improved. Comprehensive information for building energy management should be digitised and quantified to improve its systematic integration and application to the urban built environment. This review can serve as a roadmap for researchers who focus on studies of BIM-GIS integration in the sustainable built environment. Graphical abstract This paper reviews the applications of BIM-GIS integration in the field of the sustainable built environment, analyses the status quo and practical applications of such integration, and discusses research trends for its future development. Firstly, relevant literature on BIM-GIS integration is collected, quantified and analysed according to multiple indicators such as journals and keywords. Secondly, the status and practical applications of BIM-GIS integration are described and analysed from four perspectives: data integration, the life cycle of AEC projects, building energy management and urban governance. Finally, research trends and prospects for the development of integrated BIM-GIS applications are discussed. This review aims to provide a roadmap for researchers who focus on studies of BIM-GIS integration in the sustainable built environment and to expand its range of applications in sustainable urban development. Unlabelled Image Highlights • A detailed roadmap for research on the integration of BIM and GIS is provided. • A bibliometric analysis is used to quantitatively review literature from multiple viewpoints. • A critical review is conducted from four major perspectives of BIM and GIS applications. • The limitations of existing studies and future research directions are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • In this paper, we report on the process of quantifying carbon emissions for construction projects, including the source and flow of information required from cradle-to-cradle. Among the highlights: • This paper reports common materials and typical stages studied in carbon quantification. • The paper outlines the data needed and data sources for carbon quantification at all stages. • Assumptions made at each stage of the lifecycle were presented. • Transparency in carbon emission quantification is stressed. • The paper suggested adopting technology (BIM, IoT, etc.) to improve carbon quantification. blockchain: The paper suggested adopting technology (BIM, IoT, blockchain, etc.) to improve carbon quantification. Climate change has raised awareness on the need to achieve net-zero carbon emissions and improve the sustainability of buildings. To reduce the complexity of quantifying carbon emissions, there is a need for practical guidance on the quantification of lifecycle carbon emissions from buildings. Existing reviews appear to only focus on part of carbon emissions quantification and are therefore deemed unable to provide an overview of how to quantify the building's whole lifecycle carbon emissions. Hence, this study aims to review the quantification process of carbon emissions from cradle to cradle in the construction industry, which included trends in the materials studied, lifecycle stages studied, quantification methods, common data extraction practises, assumptions made and formulas used to quantify carbon emissions. A systematic review was conducted according to the PRISMA methodology. This study identified 699 publications from Scopus and Web of Science, and 65 full-text articles were included in the review. It can be concluded that the current practises lack transparency, which prohibits the comparison of different case studies. Also, all the information required for the quantification of carbon emissions during different stages was specified in detail to guide the carbon quantification process. The review further found that the production stage was the most commonly studied stage in previous research. In cases of missing information, assumptions were made, which were found to be common in practise. The underlying assumptions must be explicitly and thoroughly specified in order to avoid simplification and prevent inaccurate quantification of carbon emissions, and ultimately ensure the effectiveness of low-carbon design strategies. The review also highlighted the challenges in quantifying carbon emissions and proposed that these challenges be addressed by identifying appropriate solutions through the integrated use of digital technologies, such as Building Information Modelling (BIM), the Internet of Things (IOT), and blockchain technology. Adoption of these technologies can lead to better data collection and sharing, increased transparency, secure collaboration among stakeholders, and the potential establishment of standardised methodologies for accurate carbon emissions quantification, all of which can lead to improved energy efficiency management in the built environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM) in the construction industry has created a demand for methods to update existing facilities with accurate as-built BIM models. While terrestrial laser scanners (TLS) are commonly used for indoor surveys due to their speed and precision, they face limitations in areas with physical constraints like confined spaces and occlusions, with pipes being particularly affected. This paper presents a smartphone videogrammetry approach designed to enhance the accuracy and completeness of terrestrial laser scanner (TLS) point clouds for as-built BIM reconstruction. The method involves capturing missing areas within the TLS point cloud with smartphones and then seamlessly integrating these data into a more comprehensive multi-modal point cloud. This approach is validated using real scan data and offers convenience through the use of readily available and cost-effective smartphones, while its iterative nature facilitates progressive BIM reconstruction of pipe structures. Additionally, a compatible progressive BIM reconstruction framework is outlined, aiming to modernize scan-to-BIM practices in the construction industry, with a case study demonstrating its feasibility. • Presents a videogrammetry approach using smartphone for built environment survey. • The approach complements LiDAR scanning for as-built BIM reconstruction of pipes. • Developed an automated pipeline from video to registered multi-modal point cloud. • Describes an innovative progressive scan-to-BIM framework. • Tests on two sets of actual data are conducted to prove efficacy and feasibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reducing carbon emissions and addressing environmental policies in the construction domain has been intensively explored with solutions ranging from energy efficiency techniques with building informatics to user behavior modelling and monitoring. Such strategies have managed to improve current practices in managing buildings, however decarbonizing the built environment and reducing the energy performance gap remains a complex undertaking that requires more comprehensive and sustainable solutions. In this context, building information modelling (BIM), can help the sustainability agenda as the digitalization of product and process information provides a unique opportunity to optimize energy-efficiency-related decisions across the entire lifecycle and supply chain. BIM is foreseen as a means to waste and emissions reduction, performance gap minimization, in-use energy enhancements, and total lifecycle assessment. It also targets the whole supply chain related to design, construction, as well as management and use of facilities, at the different qualifications levels (including blue-collar workers). In this paper, we present how building information modelling can be utilized to address energy efficiency in buildings in the operation phase, greatly contributing to achieving carbon emissions targets. In this paper, we provide two main contributions: (i) we present a BIM-oriented methodology for supporting building energy optimization, based on which we identify few training directions with regards to BIM, and (ii) we provide an application use case as identified in the European research project "Sporte2" to demonstrate the advantages of BIM in energy efficiency with respect to several energy metrics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of Common Data Environment (CDE) collaboration platforms, although a requirement of the government BIM (Building Information Modelling) mandate within the UK, is an area that has been under-reported in research publications, especially in relation to the education sector for the management of undergraduate multidisciplinary student BIM projects. Up to this point, academics have focused on the use of BIM authoring and analysis tools and collaborative and multidisciplinary working methods, but not necessarily on how information is managed and the platforms that can be used in this regard. This paper presents the findings of a three-year longitudinal study undertaken at Ulster University experimenting with three different platforms for the delivery of an undergraduate multidisciplinary collaborative student BIM project. A case study methodology is employed to provide a description of experiences over the three-year period, with an ethnographic approach to data collection in the form of direct observations in the field. Thematic analysis is used to identify key trends followed by a cross-case synthesis. The results of the study identify advantages for all of the differing platforms utilised depending on the functionality and learning outcomes required, whilst highlighting challenges in terms of familiarity and assessment integration. The paper concludes by presenting potential CDE methods of integration at undergraduate Levels 4, 5 and 6 (Years 1, 2 and 3). [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

With the predicted world population growth of 83 million people per year (increasing 1.09% year on year) compounded with a strong trend for migration to urban centres, there is a developing interest by academics, industry and government to the digitalisation of the built environment and its potential impact on private enterprises, public services and the broader context of society. The governments around the world and others are aiming to guide and standardise this process by developing an array of standards to support this digitalisation, most notably on Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Smart Cities Framework. Furthermore, the advancement of the Internet of Things (IoT) is creating a highly flexible, dynamic and accessible platform for the exchange capture and of information. There is a risk that this information on the built environment is quickly becoming unmanageable, and the value of that information is quickly becoming lost. This paper presents a smart asset alignment framework that creates an alignment between the information captured at the infrastructure asset level and citizen requirements within a Smart City framework. The framework contributes to the debate on designing and developing Smart City solutions in a way that will deliver value to the citizens. • Smart cities frameworks alone in isolation will not address the citizen requirements. • Citizens currently interact with city services in isolated transitions. • A smart cities framework, alignment of citizen requirements to infrastructure asset performance. • Classification of infrastructure assets as per the functional output provides to the city service. • Classification of citizen functions and alignment to city services [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a widely established method in the architecture, engineering, construction, and facilities management (AEC/FM) industry. Although BIM focuses on processes throughout the lifecycle of the built environment, the applications in the planning phase, e.g. the generation of construction site layouts, have not reached their full potential yet. One important example herein is the allocation and dimensioning of resources (e.g., building materials and equipment) which is typically carried out by humans according to clearly defined rules and best practices. This paper presents model-based rule checking for the planning of construction site layouts. We demonstrate that existing Business Rule Management Systems (BRMS), such as the open-source rule engine Drools, can be used. We combine Drools with the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) to retrieve data from a building information model and use the information within the rule engine. We define general model requirements and implement a sample set of prototype rules. We also introduce the concept of offset geometry for rules that, for example, demand a known safety distance between temporary construction site elements. The developed approaches are explained and evaluated in field-realistic, practical case studies. Finally, we present a discussion how the application of the developed rule-based system may assist human decision making in tasks such as safe construction sites layout planning. Highlights • BIM methods currently do not include tools for construction site layout planning. • A background review presents existing manual techniques and their shortcomings. • The process of digitalizing the construction site layout planning process is explained. • Applications of rule checking in planning temporary construction objects are shown. • An outlook presents strategies for implementation in construction projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building Information Modeling (BIM) is gradually recognized and promoted as the new standard practice in the construction industry as well as the built environment. Mechanical, electrical, and plumbing system, as a system requiring regular maintenance, takes an important place in the building operation and maintenance; its failure can cause significant impacts operationally, economically, and even environmentally. As-built BIM is needed for efficient BIM-enabled facility management of buildings that were built before the existence of BIM or with outdated BIM. Modeling of the as-built BIM is currently practiced in a very manual and tedious way, requiring a considerable amount of time and effort even for a skilled modeler. This paper proposes a solution that reconstructs the as-built BIM of piping systems in buildings from LiDAR scanned point cloud data automatically. Compared to the existing works, it requires no additional data other than the unstructured point cloud with XYZ fields, no data preprocessing, and no prior knowledge of the pipe directions or dimensions. The solution comprises two stages. The first is a novel deep learning network, PipeNet, that is able to detect pipes regardless of the size of the input data and the scale of the target scene, and predict the pipe centerline points together with other pipe parameters. In the second stage, the pipe model is reconstructed through line fitting, refinement, and graph-based connectivity analysis constrained by domain knowledge that maximizes the coherence of the piping system model. The final output is converted to the Industry Foundation Classes format which is neutrally acceptable in the BIM industry. The solution is validated on both synthetic and actual scan data, and the results demonstrate its robustness, fast speed, and high recognition rate and precision. The results are discussed in detail and further improvements such as improving the precision of recognition are suggested for future works. • Presents a solution of reconstructing BIM models of piping systems from point cloud. • Introduces PipeNet, a neural network for pipe segmentation and parameter prediction. • The PipeNet comprises a module trained for optimal neighborhood selection. • Proposes a graph-based method for maximized pipe connectivity completeness. • Thorough evaluation of the solution using synthetic and real data is conducted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Built environment data is of varying nature embedding various forms of sensitivities with potential legal, contractual, intellectual property, and security implications. The paper presents a governance approach for managing multi-actor, multi-discipline, and total lifecycle data, informed by a wide industry consultation conducted in the UK between March and September 2011. The study identifies a number of barriers in engaging with Building Information Modelling (BIM) efforts with a view of facilitating collaboration around a common and integrated project specification. A governance model is proposed that addresses the identified adoption blockers underpinned by a “mixed approach”, that factors in various modes of information delivery, ranging from paper-based documents to object-based information conveyed by IFC (Industry Foundation Classes). A demonstrator system is developed and used to validate our BIM governance concepts. Our governance model is discussed in the context of the recent UK government BIM industry consultation document supported by a research and development (R&D) roadmap taking into account current industry structure and its various levels of stakeholders’ maturity, capability and readiness. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Effective environmental condition monitoring provides constant surveillance of the built environment and reveals deteriorations that could impact the daily operation of facilities, especially amid COVID situations. However, the current Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) data schema for Building Information Modelling (BIM) provided limited support to represent full semantics related to environmental sensing and monitoring. How to semantically enrich the IFC schema with enhanced data description capability for informed decision-making in smart facilities management (FM) amid COVID situations remains an open question. This paper develops a semi-automatic extension and integration of IFC data schema with Sensor Model Language (SensorML) specification in order to support automated built environment sensing and monitoring. Referring to SensorML, an extended IFC model view definition for a comprehensive description of required sensor metadata and sensing entities is presented. An Internet of Things (IoT) sensor network is then established to realise continuous data collection from a variety of wireless sensing devices. The spatial-temporal data captured by the IoT sensor network are extracted by a regular expression-based data distillation algorithm and integrated with the digital twin, in which spatial interpolation algorithms further analyse, compute, and visualise the state of the environment. The proposed method is demonstrated via an experimental study which supports real-time environmental monitoring and delivers more actionable insights to facility managers to sustain the daily operation of buildings. This study contributes new methods and models to semantically enrich the digital twin from the data perspective for environmental condition monitoring during the pandemic time which fosters the development of holistic building facility management. • Present a digital twin approach to monitor the built environment for facilities management. • Conduct data integration with textual mapping and semi-automatic relationship classification. • Propose an integrated data model based on Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) and SensorML. • Develop BIM-based algorithms for integration and interpolation of spatial-temporal data into digital twins. • Establish a wireless sensor network (mounted on UGV) for automated environmental monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Current practice in the control of surface flatness requires a significant amount of time and labor, and delivers results based on few sample measurements. Developments of Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) and Building Information Modeling (BIM) offer great opportunities to achieve a leap forward in the efficiency and completeness of dimensional control operations. This paper presents an approach that demonstrates the value of this integration for surface flatness control. The approach employs the Scan-vs-BIM principle of Bosché and Haas (2008) to segment TLS point clouds acquired on-site, by matching each point to the corresponding object in the BIM model. The novel approach then automatically applies two different standard flatness control techniques, Straightedge and F-Numbers, to the TLS points associated to each floor, and concludes with regard to their compliance with given tolerances. The approach is tested and validated using data from two actual concrete slabs. Results confirm the suitability of using TLS for conducting standard dimensional controls, and validate the performance of our system when compared to traditional measurement methods (in terms of both quality and efficiency). Furthermore, a novel straightedge generation method is proposed and demonstrated that enables more complete and homogeneous analysis of floor flatness for insignificant additional processing times. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Global economic growth is leading to a higher demand for energy. Considering the declining cost of technology and rising fossil fuel prices, the application of renewable energy technologies is promising. The worldwide use of photovoltaic electricity is growing rapidly by more than 50% a year. In the urban environment, buildings are central to human activities. Therefore, to achieve sustainable urban development, buildings are of particular importance for distributed renewable energy generation. Of different types of buildings in the built environment, high-rise buildings are of particular interest because of their high potential for harvesting a considerable amount of photovoltaic (PV) energy on vertical and horizontal surfaces. Nevertheless, this high potential is seldom harnessed mainly because the deployment of PV modules on high-rise buildings involves consideration of a complex interplay between various factors that affect the installation of PV modules (e.g., urban canyons, self-shadowing effect, surface-specific PV modules, etc.). This renders the design of PV modules in high-rise buildings a complex optimization problem, one that requires a generative design approach. In recent years, and with the advent and rising popularity of Building Information Modeling (BIM) concept, the apparatus for the implementation of such a comprehensive generative design approach is becoming increasingly available. However, to the best of authors' knowledge, there are currently no frameworks for the BIM-based generative design of PV modules for high-rise buildings. To this end, the present paper made a novel contribution to the body of knowledge by presenting a BIM-based generative design framework for PV module layout design on the whole exterior of tall buildings. This allows designers to consider the complex interaction between building surface types (e.g., windows, walls, etc.), type of PV module (e.g., opaque, semi-transparent, etc.), the efficiency of different PV modules, and the financial aspect of the PV system (i.e., revenue vs. cost at different study period). The results generated by the elaborate case study demonstrated that the generative design framework is capable of offering more favourable solutions (i.e., either or both of reduced costs and increased energy revenue) compared to baseline scenarios. It is observed that, in the majority of the studied scenarios, the optimum solutions favored a more consistent orientation of the panels (i.e., consistent pan and tilt angles across all the panels). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land Administration practices worldwide rely mainly on 2D-based systems to define legal and other spatial boundaries related to land interests. However, the built environment is increasingly becoming spatially complex. Land administrators are challenged by an unprecedented demand to utilise space above and below earth's surface. The relationships between people and land in vertical space can no longer be unambiguously represented in 2D. In addition, the current societal demand for sustainability in a collaborative environment and a lifecycle-thinking, is driving the need to integrate independent systems with standalone databases and methodologies, associated with different aspects of the Spatial Development lifeCycle (SDC). Land Administration Systems (LASs) are an important component of the SDC. Today, a LAS is often mandated and managed as a domain in isolation. Interaction and data reuse with the other phases of the SDC is limited and far from optimal. It is expected that effective 3D data collaboration, sharing, and reuse across the sectors and disciplines in the lifecycle will enable new ways of data harmonisation and use in this complex environment; will improve efficiency of design and data acquisition, as well as data quality (in relation to specific regulations); and will minimise inconsistencies and data loss within information flows. Overall, a cross-sectoral approach is directed towards improving the current state of the Land Administration (LA) domain. This paper consists of two parts. In the first, a review of the current situation, with respect to LASs is presented, concluding the needs for improvement in terms of effectiveness and consistency. In the second part, the vision for the future of LASs is introduced in a wider context, and as an important phase in the SDC, with regards to legal, technical, and organisational aspects. In this part, the needs and considerations that result from the evolving environment and the emerging technological advances are addressed, with a view to discussing a cross-sector approach to collect, maintain, reuse, and share 3D data. In such a cross-sectoral approach, various interoperability issues appear, making it necessary to introduce and use standards. In this respect, the ISO 19152:2012 Land Administration Domain Model (LADM) in its current Edition I, as well as in Edition II (expected in 2022) may serve as the standardised core structure of a 3D LAS, with respect to its role as further presented in this paper. In parallel, the evolution of the Building Information Modelling (BIM) in the design and construction industry, as well as the fact that BIM plays a central role in the life cycle of development projects, are well recognized. Emphasis is given on feasible reuse of BIM/IFC (Industry Foundation Class) data in a 3D LAS. Those considerations are addressed through a web-based system architecture for a future 3D LAS, thereby attempting to integrate heterogeneous systems in the SDC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, many researchers across the world have addressed the implementation of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in the energy assessment of the built environment. However, several potential issues still need to be resolved in order to utilise the benefits provided by BIM to a maximum degree. To fill this gap, a systematic literature review is conducted in this study to critically investigate the utilisation of BIM tools in energy assessment. To achieve the above-mentioned objective, after shortlisting the relevant papers published hitherto, using keyword searching, a systematic review was undertaken, including the application of BIM in the contexts of different countries, types of BIM tools, BIM and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) integration, energy affiliations, stakeholders' involvement and their roles, uncertainty, and sensitivity analysis. The outcomes show the most widely used and effective BIM tools in different types of construction projects in various countries. The review of the literature clearly shows that BIM tools can effectively be used in the assessment of energy performance of buildings. The article gives insight to engineers, architecture, and decision makers to carefully select appropriate BIM tools in terms of energy assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last decades, society has increasingly moved towards the adoption of digital solutions in almost every aspect of people's lives with the aim of enhancing daily activities. At the same time, the environmental impact of the built environment has attracted the attention of public opinion that is gradually perceiving the necessity of limiting its negative effects in order to safeguard the Earth and people's wellbeing. The Internet of Things is one of the biggest ecosystems that is bringing innovations encompassing digital solutions in almost every sector. On the other hand, the Building Information Modeling approach allows for data sharing among stakeholders, traceability, and the integrated management of the building or infrastructure life-cycle through a 3D informative virtual model. Our study reviews existing research works and technological solutions that integrate these two important topics to enhance the sustainability of the built environment, making it smarter. The presented review analyses the existing papers available in literature from January 2015 to December 2020, to present the best practices in this integration and discuss limitations of the identified solutions. Based on the outcomes of the analysis and aiming at the creation of a solid knowledge basis for the community interested in the sector, a comprehensive modular architecture has been proposed. Finally, new directions for future works are presented by discussing how the proposed architecture can actually facilitate the design and development phases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In both the Geospatial (Geo) and Building Information Modelling (BIM) domains, it is widely acknowledged that the integration of geo-data and BIM-data is beneficial and a crucial step towards solving the multi-disciplinary challenges of our built environment. The result of this integration—broadly termed GeoBIM—has the potential to be particularly beneficial in the context of the construction of large infrastructure projects, which could make use of data relating to the larger spatial extents typically handled in geographical information systems (GIS) as well as the detailed models generated by BIM. To date, GeoBIM integration has mainly been explored for buildings, in a 3D context and for small projects. This paper demonstrates the results of the next level of integration, exploring the addition of the fourth dimension by linking project schedule information to create 4D GeoBIM, examining interoperability challenges and benefits in the context of a number of use cases relating to the enabling works for a major commercial infrastructure project. The integrating power of location and time—knowing where and when data relate to—allows us to explore data interoperability challenges relating to linking real world construction data, created using commercial software, with other data sources; we are then able to demonstrate the benefits of 4D GeoBIM in the context of three decision making scenarios: examining the potential for prioritisation of noise mitigation interventions by identifying apartments closest to the noisiest construction process; development of a 4D location-enabled risk register allowing, for example, work to continue underground if a risk is specific to the top of a building; ensuring construction safety by using 3D buffering to ensure that the required distances between moving construction equipment and surrounding infrastructure are not breached. Additionally, once integrated, we are able to 'democratize' the data—make it accessible beyond the BIM and GIS expert group—by embedding it into a 3D/4D open source Web GIS tool. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of new climate change policies has increased the motivation to reduce energy use in buildings, as reflected by a stringent regulatory landscape. The construction industry is expected to adopt new methods and strategies to address such requirements, focusing primarily on reducing energy demand, improving process efficiency and reducing carbon emissions. However, the realisation of these emerging requirements has been constrained by the highly fragmented nature of the industry, which is often portrayed as involving a culture of adversarial relationships and risk avoidance, which is exacerbated by a linear workflow. Recurring problems include low process efficiency, delays and construction waste. Building information modelling (BIM) provides a unique opportunity to enhance building energy efficiency (EE) and to open new pathways towards a more digitalised industry and society. BIM has the potential to reduce (a) waste and carbon emissions, (b) the endemic performance gap, (c) in-use energy and (d) the total lifecycle impact. BIM also targets to improve the whole supply chain related to the design, construction as well as the management and use of the facility. However, the construction workforce is required to upgrade their skills and competencies to satisfy new requirements for delivering BIM for EE. Currently, there is a real gap between the industry expectations for employees and current training and educational programmes. There is also a set of new requirements and expectations that the construction industry needs to identify and address in order to deliver more informed BIM for EE practices. This paper provides an in-depth analysis and gap identification pertaining to the skills and competencies involved in BIM training for EE. Consultations and interviews have been used as a method to collect requirements, and a portfolio of use cases have been created and analysed to better understand existing BIM practices and to determine current limitations and gaps in BIM training. The results show that BIM can contribute to the digitalisation of the construction industry in Europe with adapted BIM training and educational programmes to deliver more informed and adapted energy strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over recent decades, more and more cities worldwide have created semantic 3D city models of their built environments based on standards across multiple domains. 3D city models, which are often employed for a large range of tasks, go far beyond pure visualization. Due to different spatial scale requirements for planning and managing various built environments, integration of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Building Information Modeling (BIM) has emerged in recent years. Focus is now shifting to Precinct Information Modeling (PIM) which is in a more general sense to built-environment modeling. As scales change so do options to perform information modeling for different applications. How to implement data interoperability across these digital representations, therefore, becomes an emerging challenge. Moreover, with the growth of multi-source heterogeneous data consisting of semantic and varying 2D/3D spatial representations, data management becomes feasible for facilitating the development and deployment of PIM applications. How to use heterogeneous data in an integrating manner to further express PIM is an open and comprehensive topic. In this paper, we develop a semantic PIM based on multi-source heterogeneous data. Then, we tackle spatial data management problems in a Spatial Database Management System (SDBMS) solution for our defined unified model. Case studies on the University of New South Wales (UNSW) campus demonstrate the efficiency of our solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]