IT & SOFTWARE 2 VIRTUAL MODELLING


Too often, key decisions are made throughout a project with little consideration of how these will affect actual building performance


The Darwen Aldridge Community Academy in Darwen, Lancashire. Aedas used building information modelling to deliver the project


relationships, as opposed to components, can also be tricky. Too many, and a model will stop being interactive even at today’s computing speeds. BIM or VIM, communication between


platforms is notoriously poor, with people having to spend valuable time to remodel data already created somewhere else. Knowing what data is actually needed from a model is also critical – it is easy to spend weeks drawing nuts and bolts that no one will ever look at, while forgetting to enclose the control strategy at handover, without which a building cannot be properly operated. As to the choice of modelling tool – whether this is off the shelf parametric


CarbonBuzz Linking up on good practice


The CarbonBuzz industry initiative – in which a number of industry companies and bodies, including Aedas, CIBSE and RIBA, are involved – continues to champion the sort of collaborative effort needed to achieve a low carbon building in operation. Its work includes the sharing of design and operational energy use data online. Around 300 project records


are hosted on the website, which also helps users to close the gap between predicted and achieved energy consumption. The data collected goes beyond the Display Energy Certification data structure, and includes energy end-


40 CIBSE Journal January 2012


uses to offer better risk management during design and to support diagnostics in operation. Funded by the Technology


Strategy Board, uploaded data will be used anonymously to inform the development of more robust prediction methods that help quantify occupant-related energy use. This can include occupancy, building management and equipment, as well as typical differences between design and as-built results. CarbonBuzz is working with


a broader steering group to meet the data-management and benchmarking requirements of architects,


engineers, local authorities, developers, landlords, facilities managers and others that benefit from greater intelligence on their built environment. One obvious area for attention is BIM, where much is said about carbon and energy use, but there is more to do to agree on industry standards to communicate energy use and contributing factors simply and easily. Having developed its robust


data structure, CarbonBuzz should complement government efforts to create a consistent data-sharing format via BIM. www.carbonbuzz.org


or bespoke – the key remains the interoperability between the different platforms available. At present, no single one can provide the programmability of GenerativeComponents (GC), the lightweight interface of Rhino, the data management of Revit, the robust parametrics of Catia, the solar feedback of Ecotect, the analysis of Energy Plus, IES or Robot, the versatility of Excel, the schedule structure of Cobie, the controls of Safe & Sound, or the benchmarking provided by the CarbonBuzz website. The approach for now is likely to be two-fold: use the tools that are appropriate for the purpose, and try to come up with ‘the mother of all’ database templates, to exchange information in a platform- independent way. But we must not lose sight of the challenge we need to rise to as designers: to add long-term value to the built environment. In the absence of strong government direction on interoperability, the question remains whether the economic climate, the developments in information technologies and modest legislation on climate change will provide the right combination of incentives for the industry to share data, collaborate more and use feedback systematically. For now, BIM is only getting us as close to a whole-life approach to design as current legislation and policies for best practice allow.


Judit Kimpian is director of sustainable architecture and research at Aedas R&D. www.aedas.com


www.cibsejournal.com


Aedas


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68