Read more about using BIM to integrate building design and planning with post-construction facility management.
Government facility managers have a difficult but essential job: They must ensure that a building and its services are functioning as designed and as required by the building occupants. They work mainly behind-the-scenes supporting their customers—the agencies and departments that depend on the electrical, mechanical, and other building systems to perform their jobs.
At times, the role of the facility manager is made more difficult when mission-critical data is not easily accessible or is missing altogether. That’s why Building Information Modeling (BIM) is increasingly being used to integrate building design and planning with post-construction facility management.
With traditional 2-dimensional computer aided drafting methods used to design and document a project, much of the valuable information created and used to plan, design, and construct a building facility does not transfer to the post-construction phase of the building life cycle. This lost information results in costly and inefficiently managed buildings.
BIM changes that quite significantly. BIM is a computer-based building design and documentation methodology for the creation and use of computable building related information in design and construction. It creates in effect, a single coordinated and internally consistent database for the building.
By using BIM during the planning and design phases, it is now possible to retain valuable information and relationships about the various components that comprise a building. In digital form, the building information can more readily be shared and analyzed during the post-construction phase to improve facility management decision-making. This improved decision-making can in turn reduce operating costs, improve facility performance, extend building life and improve occupant efficiency.
To be most effective for facilities management, the development and continuing refinement of the Building Information Model during the building planning, design, and construction phases should carefully consider those aspects of the model that will be important when construction is complete.
The Autodesk® suite of Building Information Modeling solutions – Autodesk® Revit Building, Autodesk® Revit Structure and Autodesk® Revit Systems – provides building design and construction professionals with the building design and documentation tools for creating, updating and managing such a model. This model can then be delivered downstream to facilities managers who can use the information for post-construction decision-making and analysis.
BIM provides information to facility managers about all the different building systems, including architectural, structural, plumbing, mechanical and electrical. This information could be valuable in situations where facilities managers need to provide an emergency response plan; need to improve space utilization inside the building; and document repairs and maintenance associated with the building.
In order for the Building Information Model to be most effective during the post-construction phase, the developer of that model—the project architects and engineers—must be cognizant to the fact that the model will be used for facility management. If they know and keep that fact in mind, then facilities managers would have access to specific information about the names of manufacturers, product catalogs, warranty information, room areas, room utilization and other information that may provide better insight to managing the facility more effectively.
Information can also be added and updated during the construction phase so that when the building facility is turned over to the owner, this digital building model would be an accurate and up-to-date repository of information in one single location. Building Information Models can also be created for existing construction and can simplify future building alterations and additions.
As the large government building owners and facility managers, such as the Naval Facilities Engineering Command and the General Services Administration, recognize the benefits of BIM for new construction and insist on its use, building designers will be more motivated to use BIM during the planning and design phases of a building project. BIM will improve workflow and efficiency and the coordination of documents, saving the government facility manager money.
David M. Sammons, P.E, Inlet Technology
Originally published in [acronym] magazine, Issue 2
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