AECCafe Voice 
Susan Smith
Susan Smith has worked as an editor and writer in the technology industry for over 16 years. As an editor she has been responsible for the launch of a number of technology trade publications, both in print and online. Currently, Susan is the Editor of GISCafe and AECCafe, as well as those sites’ … More » AECCafe Year In Review 2019December 19th, 2019 by Susan Smith
Each year when I look back on what was accomplished during the technology year, I’m amazed at how many of the same topics come up. The reason for this is most likely because none of the challenges put before the AEC industry are going to be solved that easily. The technology used to solve real-world problems keeps evolving and the problems themselves become morphed or more urgent. For example, climate change has been on our agenda for several years now. It’s not going to go away.
Architecture 2030 announced this year the publication of the ZERO Code standard for new building construction, which integrates cost-effective energy efficiency measures with on-site and/or off-site renewable energy resulting in Zero-Net-Carbon (ZNC) buildings. ZERO Code has been developed in response to the fact that the world is currently undergoing the largest wave of urban growth in human history. According to Architecture 2030 materials, “more than half of the global population is now concentrated in urban areas, and by 2060 two thirds of the expected population of 10 billion will live in cities. We are adding about 1.5 million people to cities every week for the foreseeable future. These new city dwellers will need housing and services, from schools, offices, and health facilities to airports and train stations. Vincent Martinez, COO and Edward Mazria, Founder and CEO of Architecture 2030 say of this effort: “While there have been worldwide improvements in building sector energy efficiency, as well as growth in renewable energy generating capacity, these have not been nearly enough to offset the increase in emissions from new construction. As a result, building sector CO2 emissions have continued to rise by nearly 1% per year since 2010. We now have a critical window of opportunity, as well as the necessary tools needed to address this massive amount of new construction before its operating emissions are locked-in for decades to come.” The outreach in place to institute the ZERO Code Renewable Energy Appendix offers a flexible approach for incorporating renewable energy, both through on-site generation and/or off-site procurement. A technical support document is available that describes several potential options for off-site procurement of renewable energy within the context of codes and presents a process for evaluating and assigning a weighting factor to each procurement method. It is anticipated that qualifying off-site renewable energy systems and their weightings will vary slightly with each adoption of the ZERO Code. The purpose of the technical support document is to provide information to enable these adaptations. The ZERO Code Renewable Energy Appendix is supported by an Energy Calculator that eases the implementation process and reduces errors when applying the prescriptive compliance path. An Application Program Interface (API) for the ZERO Code Energy Calculator has been developed enabling its implementation as a website or application for smartphones and tablets. Ultimately this approach will save years and valuable resources that would otherwise be spent on developing new compliance tools and mechanisms. The ZERO Code Energy Calculator API is free and open source. Architecture 2030 and AIA have also developed a Fact Sheet for the ZERO Code Renewable Energy Appendix and are also developing a Compliance Guide for practitioners and code officials. Reflect for a minute on the following United Nations projection: By 2060, the world is projected to add 230 billion m2 (2.5 trillion ft2) of buildings, or an area equal to the entire current global building stock*. This is the equivalent of adding an entire New York City to the planet every 34 days for the next 40 years. *UN Environment, Global Status Report 2017 In order to achieve the target set by the Paris Agreement – to limit the rise in global average temperature to below the 2 degree C threshold – all new construction must be designed to high energy efficiency standards and use no CO2-emitting fossil fuel energy to operate; by 2050 the entire built environment must be carbon neutral. The following are UN Sustainable Development Goals:
A Summary for Financial Decision-Makers of the IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 º C on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 ºC above pre-industrial levels and related global gas emission pathways. In the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, develop sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty. — New York City, 22 September 2019: Key messages from the report
Global total net C02 emissions -45 C02 in 2030 – net zero CO2 in 2050 Carbon dioxide removal At 2 ºC warming all warm water corals are gone vs 1—30% left at 1.5 º C At 2 ºC: in 10 years completely ice-free North Pole. At 1.5 º C: in 100 years “Adaptation is easy, it’s just bigger answers to usual questions,” said Keith Clarke, CBE, FREng, FICE, RIBA, Chairman, speaking on the topic, “Forum for the Future,” at the Bentley Year In Infrastructure 2019 thought leadership conference in Singapore in October. “Adaptation without mitigation is immoral; it accelerates inequality. Mitigation = radically reducing CO2E by 2050, trend to net zero by 2050; 1.5 º C by 2030. Don McLean, IES founder and CEO, spoke with AECCafe Voice about IES’ new cutting-edge digital twin technology that connects distributed energy networks, renewables, master plans, building design, operation and retrofit. Architects, engineers and developers, to city planners, ESCO’s, sustainability, energy and facilities Managers, all stand to benefit from the use of the Intelligent Communities Lifecycle platform from IES.
The ICL (Intelligent Communities Lifecycle) is a platform of interconnected decision support tools that facilitate the planning, design and operation of energy efficient and sustainable communities of any size and purpose, whether that be a company, campus, city or country. It is the most holistic tool for assessing any configuration of buildings throughout their lifecycle. By launching the ICL, IES is making their technology available to anyone interested in energy efficiency and sustainability. Through pilot projects, the technology has already delivered an interactive 3D visualization and master planning model for Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, which uncovered campus-wide energy savings of 31% and $4.7m cost savings. Company Business This year saw the launch of new companies and the acquisition of others.
Topcon Positioning Group and Bentley Systems formed a new company called Digital Construction Works (DCW) in October. Ted Lamboo, DCW CEO, formerly senior vice president of international operations, president of Bentley Asia/Pacific, and COO Jason Hallet, formerly a vice president for Topcon, plus Tom Dengenis, former chief executive for SYNCHRO, now Principal Research Officer of the newly minted Digital Construction Works, make up the DCW leadership team. Topcon has partnered with Bentley for many years, but DCW is a separate services company offering digital automation, integration and digital twinning services and fit-for-purpose solutions. The aim is to simplify digital transformation for the construction industry. DCW solutions span every phase of the project – from planning to construction and operations through to asset management – creating a digital thread that connects technologies and workflows. Because DCW is a completely new separate company, it can be agnostic to technology and process improvement. This way, technology follows the operational process change but doesn’t lead it. In an interview with Ted Lamboo, he spoke about the new venture. The construction industry contributes 13 percent of global GDP and an estimated $12.9 trillion market by 2022, and is the largest industry in the world, positioned to benefit from significant value through productivity improvements. “Vendors live in their own oyster of developing technology,” said Lamboo. “Of course, we do research and have an opinion about what’s good for the user. Even if that’s been researched, it is governed by how to apply it to their projects.” The services aspect of DCW aims to service users in making that step in adoption. “We can help them in the first couple of steps and we can help them do it themselves or educate them how to do it themselves. We can do the integration into their existing environment. If we can educate the marketplace and get everyone to adopt the technology, the savings that are possible in the construction industry are going to be great.” Customers will say that they see the advantages of a technology, but want time to figure it out and get it implemented into their organization. How can we get in there? Can you help us do that part of it? Generally customers don’t have time to take from their busy schedules to assemble the people and the technologies for either mid-stream projects or starting something new. For many years GIS and AEC professionals have sought to integrate their products and there have been partnerships created before between the two industries. Though Vectorworks supports a number of different file formats to import geospatial data, imagery and survey points, the process of importing information has been limited to the files that were available.  Vectorworks Esri partnership Now, with Vectorworks 2020, Architect, Landmark, and Designer users have access to online mapping and aerial images with Esri’s ArcGIS Online. Access to ArcGIS can be obtained through two new Vectorworks tools: Geoimage and Geolocate. This new Vectorworks functionality performs similarly to other plugins managed by Graebert’s Ares Map and ArcGIS for AutoCAD, utilizing Esri’s application programming interfaces (API). With proper geographic coordinates and projection in the Vectorworks file, street map imagery and aerial imagery can be immediately placed into the design layer. Depending on the user’s paid ArcGIS online service plan, other mapping imagery can be imported as well. Cropping is an essential part of this feature, since most mapping outputs will depict the street mapping and aerial imagery beyond the project site. Autodesk and Esri announced a partnership creating tighter integration, AEC ArcGIS collections. According to Autodesk company materials, because engineers and designers can access ArcGIS content in Autodesk applications, they can reduce the time spent finding data, requesting it in a usable format, and importing it. They can also save data to ArcGIS where additional users can access and share information. ArcGIS streamlines project delivery, from planning to operations. Esri’s partnership with Autodesk enables you to deliver data to the right user, at the right time, with the right tool. Project information can easily follow the design process, seamlessly flowing between applications. The collections enable teams to improve data visualization, work better together, and gain understanding of project status. These collections are built on Esri’s powerful next generation GIS platform, enabling users to easily turn raw 2D and 3D project datasets into digital and print maps. Esri also showcased their integrated offerings at Autodesk University in Las Vegas this year. Another interesting story this year was the acquisition of Onshape by PTC. Onshape is said to be the first Software as a Service (SaaS) product development platform that unites robust computer aided design (CAD) with powerful data management and collaboration tools. This is a circular story – last year we announced the formation of Onshape by CAD industry giants, Jon Hirschtick, John McEleney, and Dave Corcoran, all inventors of and former executives at SolidWorks. And now their brainchild comes full circle around to land at SolidWorks’ competitor, PTC. Jon has assumed a senior role leading the OnShape business at PTC and will report directly to CEO and President of PTC, Jim Heppelmann. Technology that Hit its Stride Carl Storms, Senior Applications Expert of IMAGINiT said there is a lot of interest in programming at the AEC level such as computational design available with the Autodesk product Dynamo that has been available for awhile now. As people are tasked with doing more in a space of less time, customers want to program their own add-ins for Revit and learn some coding to automate processes to save time. Computational design, automating a task with Dynamo, or Clarity allows you to remotely launch a Dynamo graph or print sheets in the middle of the night. Generative design plays into computational design, and Project Refinery, in beta, that sits on top of Dynamo, can review the design possibilities and come back with one design – narrowing down to a realistic option to minimize or eliminate mundane tasks. New Products Trimble announced the Trimble® XR10 with HoloLens 2 system, a worksite-ready mixed-reality solution that enables workers to visualize 3D data on project sites for easier and more efficient planning, collaboration and reporting. The new solution is enabled by two central components:
Jordan Lawver, Portfolio Manager, Mixed Reality, Trimble, described the new Trimble XR10 with HoloLens 2 system as follows: “The ability to overlay BIM data on a construction site provides workers with an enhanced understanding of design intent and empowers them to better coordinate the work to be done with the other stakeholders on site. On a project, inaccurate or outdated information and miscommunication can result in costly mistakes, causing inefficiency and jeopardizing project timelines. Trimble Connect for HoloLens and the XR10 enable the teams to bring their data into the actual environment, foreseeing the work and possible site issues before they happen. Trimble Connect is the digital backbone of the project, while Trimble Connect for HoloLens is the bridge that fully connects the project data directly to the field, so users can explore and interact with their BIM data at scale – empowering quick, informed decisions.”  According to the 2018 Gartner Hype Cycle, Digital Twin is a trend that is now approaching the “Peak of Inflated Expectations” and is estimated to hit the “Plateau of Productivity” within 5 to 10 years. Image courtesy of Gartner, Inc. IDC recently noted that by 2020, 30% of global 2000 companies will be using data from Digital Twins to improve organizational productivity by as much as 25%. According to the 2018 Gartner Hype Cycle, Digital Twin is a trend that is now approaching the “Peak of Inflated Expectations” and is estimated to hit the “Plateau of Productivity” within 5 to 10 years. Image courtesy of Gartner, Inc. A good description of a digital twin is as follows: “A digital twin is a digital representation of a physical object or system. The technology behind digital twins has expanded to include large items such as buildings, factories and even cities, and some have said people and processes can have digital twins, expanding the concept even further. The idea first arose at NASA: full-scale mockups of early space capsules, used on the ground to mirror and diagnose problems in orbit, eventually gave way to fully digital simulations.” – Network World In our AECCafe Voice Industry Predictions 2019, digital twins were cited as one of the trends to watch in 2019. In the UK, the National Infrastructure Commission is exploring creating a digital copy of the country’s entire infrastructure. This would involve linking smaller digital twins of the country’s cities and towns and infrastructure networks. It is hoped that the UK digital twin would help in the preparation for and response to extreme weather events. This would be a collaborative effort involving both private and public sectors in all corners of the country. AECCafe Special Report: Digital Twin Technology Mirrors AEC Reality, Materializes the Intangible Architecture on Fire With sadness, we witnessed the damage of an architectural icon in April of this year, with the flames that engulfed and destroyed the spire and roof of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris. The cathedral was 3D scanned in 2011 and 2012 by Andrew Tallon, a Vassar art professor who was a Francophile and lover of medieval architecture, particularly Gothic cathedrals. Tallon died in November of 2018, but his work may provide valuable insight into the lost parts of the cathedral structure. Just a week before the cathedral burned, a Vassar team gathered to plan the inventorying of the near terabyte of 3D modeling data that Tallon had gathered. The Architectural Future of Notre Dame Since that time, architects have been pondering various ideas for the re-design of the destroyed spire and roof. Summary While the topics reviewed this past year are not the only ones, they are indicative of what has transpired in the AEC industry over the course of 12 months. Stay tuned for January’s coverage of trends and predictions for 2020, and see what the experts predict will be the hot technologies of the coming year. Tags: 3D, 3D cities, AEC, architects, architecture, Autodesk, Bentley Systems, BIM, building, building design, building information modeling, CAD, climate change, collaboration, engineers, generative design, infrastructure, laser scanning, SolidWorks, Trimble, visualization, Year In Infrastructure 2019 Categories: 2D, 3D, 3D PDF, 3D printing, AEC, AECCafe, apps, Autodesk, BIM, building information modeling, construction, drones, engineering, field, field solutions, file sharing, geospatial, GIS, greenhouse gas emissions, holograms, IES, IFC, integrated project delivery, IoT, mobile, point clouds, project management, simulation, site planning, sustainable design, Tekla, visualization, wearable devices, World Ocean Day, YII 2019 |
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