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The rapid acceleration of BIM

by Dr Stephen Hamil
Director of Design and Innovation and Head of Building Information Modelling at NBS

Stephen has a particular interest in Building Information Modelling (BIM) and is one of those leading the work at NBS to change specification data from “words on a page” to “intelligent objects describing the building”. Stephen joined NBS in 1999 and has led the software development of products and services such as NBS Building, NBS Plus, NBS Scheduler and NBS Domestic Specification. Prior to joining NBS, Stephen studied at Durham University where his first degree was in Structural Engineering, followed by a PhD in the computer modelling of reinforced concrete beam to column connections.

All around the world

This time last year, many people's view of BIM was that it was something that only a small specialist area of the industry had really adopted. There was a perception that it required a large investment, both financially and in training, and was a long way from entering mainstream construction practice.

However, throughout 2010, I was fortunate to meet with many people in the construction industry working at the forefront of BIM, and it was clear that the rapid acceleration of BIM adoption had now truly started.

In September I attended the buildingSMART summit week in Copenhagen and it was fascinating to see how BIM models where being passed between different software applications and how knowledge was being shared between different disciplines on a project team. The highpoint of the week was the evening we spent at the new Ramboll head office, where they showed us how they had adopted BIM from day one to produce a truly magnificent building. The designers worked together sharing their models. The construction team used a combined single BIM to schedule the work and eliminate clash detections. Finally, Ramboll, as the building owner, is now using this BIM for facility management of the premises.

Ramboll building, Copenhagen

Ramboll building, Copenhagen

Other highlights of 2010 for me include the BSRIA and CIBSE BIM conferences at the end of the year. Memorable presentations from Paul Morrell (Chief Construction Advisor), Sam Collard (Laing O'Rourke) and Dan Clipson (Arup) left all attendees with a feeling that, after many years of talking about BIM, now was really the time it was hitting the mainstream. Paul Morrell went as far as saying that an upcoming report to the Construction Clients Board in March 2011 would "mark the beginning of a commitment to a timed programme of transformation". It is expected that BIM will be a requirement for all government construction projects above a certain size.

BIM now, in the UK

In November, NBS sent a BIM survey to over 6,500 construction industry professionals. The results were fascinating and will soon be published in a report. They showed a clear split in the industry. Almost half admitted they were not even aware of BIM; however, the remainder were aware and are making preparations to adopt it on the majority of their projects. What this may leave us with, is a two tier construction industry, with a real risk of many companies being left behind. The key now is for companies such as NBS, and organisations like the RIBA, to keep on pushing the message to make all aware of the benefits of BIM.

Activity at NBS

At NBS, we are investing heavily in turning our specification and product information into digital objects in anticipation of the widespread adoption of BIM. This work is well advanced and we have a number of our existing NBS Building and NBS Engineering Services customers beta testing the developments each month. Moving the words in a specification into a rich information model will allow this data to be shared amongst the project team more effectively and allow work to start very early in the project with an outline specification. Then, with no information loss, this will be developed alongside the CAD model through the life of the project to produce a contract specification and finally a record specification. The specification model and the CAD model will be integrated so that design decisions are documented once and in the right place.

The new NBS specification model

The new NBS specification model

Our new specification model will make life much easier for design and construction teams. We are modelling the relationships between the products that comprise construction systems or elements. This means that, for each system, the designer is offered the appropriate products automatically. Because the relationships are modelled properly, deleting the parent system will also delete all of the child products. In addition, the links to standards, regulations and product information are being improved and it will be possible to interrogate the specification for reports on key items such as contractor actions, reference documents and other user defined items.

We also realise that the NBS specification is most definitely not a silo of static information. Through on-going research and collaboration we are partners in:

A Technology Strategy Board project developing an interoperable toolkit for costing embodied and operational carbon
A project with Northumbria University looking into how information in the CAD and specification models can be used to drive automated Building Regulations approval.

Not a specialist activity

Some see BIM as a new specialist activity that is too big a leap to take. However, I believe that it is the job of the construction industry data providers and software companies, such as NBS, to make BIM happen "under the hood". What we need is quality, structured data − specifications, standards, regulations, products, and costs − alongside amazing, intuitive, software. With this in place, over time, people will no longer talk about BIM as a specialist activity, it will simply be designers designing and constructors constructing more effectively.