Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a trend-setting concept involving creation of a digital or virtual model of a building prior to construction. More sophisticated than 3D modeling, BIM is evolving and will eventually contain layer upon layer of construction data.

Creators of BIM envision that in a successful BIM project the entire project team—owner, architect, engineers, consultants, code officials, general contractors and specialty contractors—will be involved from the project’s inception.

Each team member would play a crucial role in the project’s concept, design and execution. Full collaboration of the construction team would allow for increased speed of project delivery, enhanced economics for the project and true lean construction at levels never yet experienced in the construction industry. The end result will be a project that meets the owner’s specifications.

For many years, SMACNA members have explained that when they have a strong role in onsite project coordination, as well as preconstruction planning, the end result is a more efficient and cost-effective job. The BIM concept is a proponent of preconstruction collaboration and interoperability of team members before construction begins. As a result, the ramifications on SMACNA members may be significant.

Shaping the development of BIM are several construction industry organization and committees. SMACNA is represented on the buildingSMARTalliance board of directors—and the International Alliance for Interoperability. SMACNA is also a participant in an ASC/AGC/ASA committee writing a chapter on BIM in the “Guidelines for a Successful Construction Project.”

Following are frequently asked questions about BIM and answers from SMACNA’s Technical Resources Department.

Q. What is BIM?

A. BIM stands for Building Information Modeling and may be defined as the development and use of a computer-generated model that simulates the construction and operation of a facility. The resulting model (also referred to as BIM) is a data-rich, object-oriented, intelligent and parametric digital representation of the facility, from which views and data appropriate to various users’ needs can be extracted and analyzed to generate information for decision-making and improving the process of delivering the facility.

Q. If software "x” is a product advertised as enabling users to adopt a BIM strategy, does that mean that users of product "x” are, by definition, adopting a BIM strategy?

A. No, not necessarily. Just because one has BIM-enabling technology does not necessarily mean one is in fact doing “BIM.” In order to do BIM, at least two activities must be taking place, one is integration and the other is collaboration. You can use a BIM enabling technology without doing either of these.

The integration activity should be aiming at integration within the AEC-FM (Architecture, Engineering, and Construction-Facilities Manager) project team. In short, this is known as Integrated Practice. For more information visit The American Institute of Architects. The collaboration activity involves teams from different disciplines all aiming at the same goal. That goal is to reduce or eliminate errors and waste from the construction process. The goal also includes integrating the data into higher order systems, like those proposed by the OGC (Open Geospatial Consortium) Web services test bed (OWS-4) or perhaps that of code checking at the government agency level, e.g. International Code Council’s SMARTcodes.

So, a BIM-enabling technology is one that allows you to share information or data with different disciplines/organizations/interest groups within a vendor-specific suite of software packages and outside the vendor suite of packages, with competing technologies. The inside/outside part of this concept is a serious part of the BIM solution--it is the interoperability part of the solution that the IAI (International Alliance for Interoperability), buildingSMARTalliance and other interested groups are all concerned about. Without generalized adoption of Industry Foundation Classes (IFCs), we can end up with fragmented vendor-specific solutions that don’t talk to each other, or do so poorly. Q. What are IFCs?

A. Industry Foundation Classes (IFCs) provide a common data model to represent building objects and construction industry processes using an object hierarchy that enables interoperability with a great degree of flexibility. Any construction industry software application can use the IFC model. At present, several building industry tools have implemented import and export features for IFCs, including CAD systems as well as visualization, estimation, costing and energy modeling tools.

Q. How is BIM related to the Integrated Practice?

A. That depends on our point of view. Vendors have one view or multiple views depending on what they are selling, users have another, while intellectuals have yet another. The Integrated Practice is a process composed of a suite of tools, one of which is a BIM-enabled CAD software. The other tools may be data portals that “integrate” product information with BIM; guide specification tools that “integrate” BIM with specification production; estimating tools that “integrate” costs with data from the other tools to produce estimates; engineering tools that “integrate” calculations with other BIM tools; and many more, including model checkers that “read” data from these currently disparate tools to integrate the work until IFCs are mature and fully usable.

The Integrated Practice and BIM are processes that can be adopted by degrees. That is “one size does not fit all,” but the nature of these processes allow them to be adopted in an additive way. For example, a firm could start with a BIM-enabled CAD software tool, then add a model checker, then add a BIM-compatible guide specification tool, etc. In other words, they can build their integrated practice as needs dictate.