Take out waste

by Paul Markgraff

The surge in Building Information Modeling (BIM) among forward-thinking commercial contractors signals that if you don’t already know what it is, it’s time to learn.

The largest pyramid in Giza, outside Cairo in Egypt, was built about 4,500 years ago for the Pharaoh Khufu. Tens of thousands of workers labored for decades with rope and wood to move nearly 6.5 million tons of stone into its current form, a form that was probably designed on papyrus, an early form of paper.

Several millennia later, unbelievable inventions have transformed the way we build: the internal combustion engine, hydraulic power, the stationary crane, the integrated circuit, and too many others to name.

Oddly though, after thousands of years, structures are still conceptualized and detailed on paper.
“We have this imperfect intermediary tool called paper that’s been around since the pyramids and hasn’t really changed,” says John Tocci, CEO of Tocci Building Corp. and chairman of the Associated General Contractors’ Building Information Modeling (BIM) Task Group. “This is the way a pharaoh communicated with his builders. It’s time for us to get real here.”

There are other reasons to get real.

In August 2004, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) released a report that estimated $15.8 billion a year is lost in the construction industry because of “the highly segmented nature of the industry, the industry’s continued paper-based business practices, a lack of standardization, and inconsistent technology adoption among stakeholders.”

Wait, there’s more.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, construction ranks lowest of any major industry in productivity. Since 1964, all other American industries experienced an aggregate increase in productivity per worker of 250 percent. Over the same period, construction worker productivity declined about 25 percent.

“What this comes down to is recognizing that the industry is ‘siloed.’ The industry has built up this culture, this separation between all interested parties,” says Huw Roberts, global marketing director, building, for software provider Bentley. “Because of the separation, you get errors, non-exchange of information and information entered and created several different times, with each re-entry of information providing an opportunity for error.”

That’s where BIM comes in.

Information is power
It may sound a little weird the first time you say it, but get used to it: BIM. You say it like the name Tim, but it has numerous other names: virtual design and construction, virtual building, buildingSmart, integrated practice, and integrated project delivery.

The names may be different but they mean the same thing for commercial construction: the death of waste.

Technically speaking, BIM is a digital representation of the building process that facilitates information transfer and interoperability in digital format. It covers spatial relationships, geometry, geography, quantities and properties of building components.

In simplest terms, BIM means model-based construction management. Instead of using the drawing for the basis of all decision-making on design, quantities, cost calculation and scheduling, contractors, owners and architects use a three-dimensional, computer-based representation.

“The difference with BIM is that everyone agrees upon how to connect the information,” says Roberts. “With the old approach, you built it in your own silo, using your own methods, and you threw it over the wall to the next guy. The technology side is greatly enabling, but it’s not the main point. It’s about process and the approach to how you are working.”

At the 3D level, contractors can locate potential conflicts between mechanical, electrical, plumbing and HVAC before they appear in the real world and cost owners and developers time and money. BIM’s fourth dimension – schedule – can be streamlined and made more accurate, eliminating waste. The fifth dimension – cost – can be tracked throughout the process to locate and prevent potential overruns.

“There are constant changes in design, which has a direct impact on cost and schedule. If you have an integrated system, you get better information to the procurement department about what’s changed and the impact on the material needs,” says Dominic Gallello, CEO of BIM software maker Graphisoft. “BIM proved long ago that it helps users understand much earlier how changes affect overall budget while identifying potential problems such as coordination errors.”

This elementary definition of BIM is supposed to provide a rudimentary understanding of what it is and how it works. But for contractors who are a little skeptical, take a look at the bottom-line results.

So, what’s in it for me?
Smart contractors will want to get past the hype and find out why they should switch from a system that’s made them money for many years to a system they’ve never tried. Here are a couple of great motivators: less waste and more profit.

“We’ve seen more than a 50 percent reduction in what we call non-discretional change orders,” says Tocci. “ We can do something about the design not meeting code and various disciplines not communicating effectively with each other. Within the design, we believe that we’ll be able to nearly eliminate these problems within 12 to 18 months.”

Every year, Bentley conducts an independently judged rewards program for its users. The company has seen hundreds of examples where companies present staggering reductions in waste and huge cost savings.

“We have found with BIM a fairly consistent return on projects of 35 percent improvement in process on the design side and 10 to 15 percent improvement on the cost for the project during construction,” says Roberts. “This kind of return is not just the exception. It’s in example after example after example.”

The reduction in errors alone leads to major cost savings realized by all members of a project. Reducing the time it takes to complete a project also leads directly to hard cost savings from waste and ineffective labor.

“Modeling dramatically reduces problems that may not crop up until the construction phase,” says Gallello. “A 2D workflow typically produces a woefully inaccurate depiction of what needs to be built.”

From the purchasing department’s perspective, BIM offers better information faster. Purchasers won’t be as disconnected from the myriad changes that take place on a project.

“BIM means much more timely information and feeling more connected to the flow of each project,” says Gallello.

Graphisoft conducts training courses for BIM users and BIM fence-sitters. Enthusiasm for doing business this way is high, says Gallello.

“Three years ago, we were teaching thought leaders in the construction industry,” he says. “But now it’s more mainstream. I would say it’s past the early adoption phase. It’s not yet in the routine stage where everyone does it, but everyone is aware of it.”

Bentley agrees, noting that demand for its BIM technology, training and services is seeing extraordinary growth.

To learn more about specific BIM software packages, visit www.Construction-Purchasing.com.

Published in the November/December 2007 issue of Contractor Tools and Supplies magazine.

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