“What are digital twins and specifically urban twins?” This was the question is posed at the beginning of the webinar by Michael Jansen, founder and CEO of CityZenith in a recent webinar hosted by CityZenith and ABI Research. They are virtual replicas of buildings, infrastructure and physical assets, fully interconnected with the data in and around them. Digital twins can provide actionable insight for optimization in design, engineering, construction and operations through simulation and prediction of future outcomes.
Archive for the ‘Architecture 2030’ Category
Urban Digital Twins Contribute Toward the Race to Zero
Friday, September 24th, 2021AECCafe 2020 Year End Technology Wrap-Up
Saturday, December 19th, 2020It goes without saying that the Covid-19 virus has upended our lives and industries around the world beyond most people’s imagination and not in a good way. Most people I speak with want 2020 to end, eager to herald the start of a new year and new beginnings.
ZERO Code for New Building Construction Published by Architecture 2030
Thursday, July 18th, 2019Vincent Martinez, COO and Edward Mazria, Founder and CEO of Architecture 2030 responded to questions from AECCafe Voice about the new ZERO Code Renewable Energy Appendix designed to add requirements for renewable energy systems.
AECCafe Industry Predictions for 2019 – Part 4
Friday, February 1st, 2019In Part 4 of our AECCafe Industry Predictions, certain trends are further supported by submissions – support for and increased use of more cloud-based technologies, mobile technologies, the movement toward more efficiency in the construction business,virtual reality and augmented reality, the further integration of GIS and CAD, and Digital Twins.
AECCafe Industry Predictions for 2019 Part I
Thursday, January 10th, 2019Happy New Year!
It’s exciting to predict what may be the technologies of the new year. Many of you have a finger on the pulse of what is up and coming and can share valuable insights with our readers.
AECCafe Year In Review 2018
Thursday, December 20th, 20182018 brought with it the realization and development of various technologies that will serve to move the AEC industry forward and in some cases, serve the concept of digital cities more widely. Digital Twin technology has emerged as a force to be reckoned with in the coming years.
AECCafe Editorial Calendar 2019
Thursday, November 1st, 2018AECCafe will focus on specific editorial for 2019, so be sure to check in with our Editorial Calendar to find out when might be a good time for your story to be shown. Throughout the year, we provide space for Current Events, as the technology industry is evolving, and we can’t know at the time of this writing just what will be new, groundbreaking and/or disruptive in the coming year.
AECCafe Voice Special Report: What Makes for BIM Interoperability?
Thursday, September 27th, 2018The built environment is increasingly more digitized, relying heavily on large building models to hold all aspects of a building project. Thus, the need for BIM Interoperability is greater as the necessity grows for stakeholders to be able to access the information inside these complex and huge models.
For AEC firms, it is very common to use multiple software products within the same organization, as well as outside the organization. No single BIM software solution or integrated system can fulfill the requirements of the AEC industry. All these products throughout the design process need to be able to communicate with one another.
Standards organizations have come forward to suggest that they have the answer to interoperability in the BIM world. But currently what most vendors are able to achieve is perhaps an increase in interoperability. Does anyone offer total interoperability?
Some of our respondents define BIM interoperability in this way:
“Interoperability is about handing over the right amount of information, to the right people at the right time,” says David Lash, product manager, Trimble, Tekla Structures Division. “It’s about hitting milestones for people who want to stay up to date with the wider project, even on a daily basis.”
“Communication, communication, communication,” says Joe Eichenseer, director, Building Lifecycle Solutions, North America IMAGINiT. “Interoperability allows us to communicate better and reduce or eliminate the chance of translation errors between systems.”
UK BIM Alliance Roadshow and Updates 2018
Friday, June 1st, 2018Coming up is the UK BIM Alliance Roadshow 2018, a tour entitled “Facilitating the Digital Transformation Of the Built Environment.” This event will offer information about how the UK BIM Alliance is making this possible for and with the industry. The news from the Alliance will include buildingSMART news and actual examples and case studies and begins June 21s in Birmingham, with the focus on the use of BIM in Facilities Management.
According to John Eynon, Founding Board Member, UKBIMA now has projects on the go, praise and patrons, some profit, and recognition on the global stage, particularly through their recent merger with buildingSMART UK+I.
They are also close working with the Centre for Digital Built Britain in Cambridge on the Level 2 and 3 agendas.
A little history: In October of 2016, buildingSMART UK launched the UK BIM Alliance, which was the UK government’s strategy for driving improvements across construction strategy, and by 2017, all public funded projects would be requiring BIM Level 2. This has been the evolution of the UK BIM Alliance.
Dr. Anne Kemp, Atkins, chair of BuildingSMART UK, Chair of ICE’s BIM Action Group, who spoke on the utility topic, “Out of Sight and Out of Mind” at the Bentley Year in Infrastructure Conference in London, asking at that time: “Did all projects transfer to BIM Level 2? Actually, we are a bit further from that in reality. Three million people must be reached. The guys who are being affected by utility strikes are those who we need to reach.”
Her focus was on knowing what’s underground in the way of utilities and using BIM and GIS tools to track outcomes.
“We need to be transforming our utilities through intelligent use of BIM, digital, long overdue collaboration, and common sense,” Kemp said.
Kemp said that the launch of the UK BIM Alliance was going to help their progress at the BuildingSMART UK for feeding data about their buried utilities.
In 2017, the GCS transition of Task Group to L3 (BIM Level) was predicted. There is a need for industry focus and stewardship of Level 2 and to achieve 2020 “Business as usual”. “We need the foundations of BIM Level 2 to be able to realize the ambitions of Level 3,” Kemp explained. “We are providing that industry focus of moving through analog into that digital transformation, through 3D modeling and integrated real time modeling. We are working at the structured controlled data in BIM Level 2. We’ve also got to control that uncontrolled dirty data, and how do we do that?”
There is a need to think about outcomes rather than just output, said Kemp, and not just discussing 2D drawings or data (or 3D). How does data need to be delivered in order for us to do our jobs?
“We have a convergence of what is needed with BIM, and that’s where the UK BIM Alliance comes in,” said Kemp. “BIM for rail, water, survey, hospitals, has a lot of interest around this area. The UK BIM Alliance grew out of government initiatives, and we are moving to BIM level 3. We need industry to step up and demonstrate BIM Level 2.”
The initiative really had to embrace the entire industry. By setting the mandate that they must achieve BIM Level 2 by 2020, they are challenging themselves. They are being innovative and inclusive and transparent.
“We target people who need to know about this stuff,” said Kemp. “BIM Level 2 has been defined. Bimlevel2.org is available and we’re here to help industry implement.”
There is BIM for infrastructure and there needs to be BIM for utilities.
What can we do from a buried utilities point of view?
What is complementary for ISOs and smart cities is working on an evolving landscape. The UK BIM Alliance is developing a taskforce on convergence with smart cities.
“Disruptive technology changes the face of industries, but we are also in an age of disruptive data,” Kemp concluded. “You have to have your people work through, understand and tailor themselves to the new processes.”
- COBie to IFC processes
- The BuildingSMART chair UK chapter is supporting the BIM Level 2
- BIM enabled through to operations and maintenance
- Not just about design and construction
- TOTEX and total expenditure instead of operational expenditure.
The government is looking at procurement methods. The background to BIM is asset management.
Key decisions have to be made through the life of a project. You also have projects running simultaneously at different stages, so you need to be sure you have the right information, and data fed into a system users can trust.
She is looking forward to better information and management through BIM.
Autodesk BIM 360 Docs is designed to help government clients comply with the BIM Level 2 mandate in the UK. Process described here:
Autodesk and UK BIM Level 2 Mandate
Other UK BIM Alliance Events
The Product Data Working Group Alliance Product Data Working Group which is consulting on the state of the nation on product data has published two interim reports.
Meeting 1 Interim Report
Meeting 2 Interim Report
Join the conversation on the dedicated #product_data slack channel or email us.
BIMovation – Faro are hosting an event on June 5th where Anne Kemp, UKBIMAlliance Chair will be speaking – register here
Facilitating the digital transformation of the Built Environment – The first of our roadshow events takes place in Birmingham on June 21st where John Eynon will be presenting the latest news alongside other guest speakers. Register here
CSIC Distinguished Lecture – Anne Kemp is delivering the distinguished lecture on June 29 where she takes A glimpse into the future….By considering the past. The challenges, the opportunities – and our consciences. Register here
GDPR
The UK BIM Alliance has updated their privacy policy inline with the new GDPR regulations. Please visit this page for more information.
New View on Sustainability: 3D Printed Housing for Underserved Populations
Friday, April 6th, 2018In a day and age where affordable housing is at a premium, along comes the company ICON, a construction technologies company with the primary goal of revolutionizing homebuilding. How do they propose to do that?