Interoperability and Future

Reading the second version of the BIM Handbook (2011), it is obvious that there have been multiple attempts to improve the interoperability of the different BIM applications. There have been attempts to implement the IFC exchange model in various parts in order to integrate all phases in the construction industry, which will then improve the productivity and efficiency. As Ben-David mentioned in his post, BIM software is used to design and construct buildings before any decisions, regarding the materials or sites, have been made. It is very important that the BIM software can be used by all the design and construction teams involved. According to the article “Interoperability and BIM. Development and Use of Building Information Model,” current technologies that manage the construction process are not adequate enough to address all the issues that are developed throughout the process; there is a 10% loss due to wasted materials and 30% of the construction process is rework. As a result, there is a loss of $15.8 billion per year due to lack of interoperability in the software used in the design and construction operations. This fact was also discussed in class last week.

The key difference between the 2008 and 2011 versions of the BIM handbook is the expansion on the other BIM-related standard efforts; IFC and XML schema are not the only exchange data models that are used. As Eric Kuszewski mentioned during his presentation last week, IFC is a great schema for software exchanges, but not always greatly executed. The 2011 version highlights the use of COBie, or Construction Operations Building information exchange, which deal with operations and maintenance and relationships between the construction team and the owner. The development of new sets of outlined-structured classification tables have replaced the building-related classification systems and are used in BIM tools and methods.

                There is still a lot of work that needs to be done in order to achieve interoperability among all the BIM software programs without any challenges. Until this point, a lot of these changes have to be performed manually and it results in lower productivity and efficiency in the construction industry. BIM software programs are extremely popular worldwide and will take over the construction industry to efficiently complete buildings, as Wang Chunyi suggests in his blog post.

Sources:

Zhyzhneuski, A. (2011). Interoperability and BIM. Development and Use of Building Information Model. http://www.academia.edu/2053381/Interoperability_and_BIM._Development_and_Use_of_Building_Information_Model

Sabol, L. (2007). Technology, Change and the Building Industry. http://dcstrategies.net/files/2_sabol_technology_change.pdf

BIM Handbook (2011). Chapter 3 Interoperability.