27 research outputs found
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Inefficiency in FM, can BIM help?
Purpose:
The Digital Built Britain (BIM Level 3) aims to extend BIM into operation, by promoting a life cycle approach for buildings through an integrated digital environment. Nevertheless the main focus of both BIM level 2 and level 3 is mainly on design, construction and hand over, therefore the current understanding and use of BIM for facilities management is still limited. Current literature and research focusing on BIM and FM show only a marginal use of the technology, especially in terms of how BIM can be used beside maintenance. The purpose of this research is to determine which tasks, among the ones performed by facilities managers are perceived to be more inefficient. By identifying the data needed to improve the performance of tasks, the study aims to establish if building models can retain this information and increase the efficiency of FM practices.
Findings:
This paper presents the results of an online questionnaire survey aimed to ascertain the level of perceived inefficiencies in facilities management. Through the analysis of Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) data models, the research identifies the data set needed to improve inefficiencies and indicates the benefits of implementing BIM within the FM industry
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Delivering long-term building performance: A user-centred approach
In recent years the drive for the delivery of sustainable built environments has resulted in a focus on energy efficiency (regulated energy) in order to reduce CO2 emissions and mitigate against climate change.
However, as regulated-energy is decreased the proportional importance of un-regulated energy (small power etc.), which is heavily influenced by occupants, is predicted to increase. In addition there is a body of evidence linking occupant health, wellbeing and productivity to both occupant behaviour and the building environment and it has been suggested that predicted climate change has the potential to impact further on comfort, energy use and the wider building environment.
In this context the short term focus on regulated energy efficiency, although not without merit, risks ignoring the influence of occupants and may impact upon occupant wellbeing, energy performance and ultimately long term building performance. Such a scenario could result in premature building obsolescence.
This paper, building on a body of research by the authors (and others) and supported by a review of the relevant literature, suggests that while consideration near term regulated energy remains important, this alone may not deliver long term performance. The paper presents a theoretical model of long-term building performance, highlighting the need to consider the impact of occupant behaviour on energy use, the impact of the building environment on occupant wellbeing and the potential impacts of climate change. The paper suggests that a user focused approach to design considering long term performance and an active approach to building management is required
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Improving FM task efficiency through BIM: a proposal for BIM implementation
Purpose:
The purpose of the research presented was to investigate which tasks among the ones performed during a buildings’ operational phase are perceived to be more inefficient and to investigate if the information within a Building Information Model (BIM) could help improve tasks efficiency.
Design/methodology/approach:
The Digital Built Britain (BIM Level 3) aims to extend BIM into operation, by promoting a life cycle approach for buildings through an integrated digital environment. Nevertheless, the main focus of both BIM level 2 and level 3 is mainly on design, construction and hand over, therefore the current understanding and use of BIM for a buildings’ occupancy phase is still limited. Current literature and research focusing on BIM and building management show only a marginal use of the technology, especially in terms of how BIM can be used beside maintenance.
Findings:
The paper presents the results of an online questionnaire survey aimed to ascertain the level of perceived inefficiencies of operational tasks. Through the analysis of Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) data models, the research identifies the data set needed to improve the efficiency of the tasks and presents a structured implementation plan to identify which information should be prioritised in the model implementation.
Originality/value:
The study presents part of a methodology developed by the author aimed to implement a BIM model for existing buildings including information that would support the management of the single facility/portfolio. While other studies have looked into BIM and operational phase, especially in relation to asset maintenance, this study has focused on understating how the information included in the model can improve the tasks efficiency
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The impact of regulations on overheating risk in dwellings
Many new and emerging regulations and standards for buildings focus on climate change mitigation through energy and carbon reduction. In cool climates, such reductions are achieved by optimizing the building for heat retention. It is increasingly recognized, however, that some degree of climate change is now inevitable. New and existing buildings need to consider this to ensure resilience and an ability to adapt over time. In this context, the current approach to regulation that largely remains focused on the ‘point of handover’ may not be fit for purpose. This paper focuses on a ‘typical’ dwelling designed to a range of standards, representing current or emerging approaches to minimizing energy use, using a range of construction methods, where a number of adaptations are available to occupants. It considers, through the use of building performance simulation, how each configuration is likely to perform thermally over time given current climate change predictions. It is demonstrated that the current approach to assessing overheating risk in dwellings, coupled with the regulatory focus on reducing energy consumption, could result in significant levels of overheating. This overheating could, in the near future, present a risk to health and result in the need for significant interventions
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Using BIM to facilitate iterative design
Architecture design practitioners typically generate and assess few design alternatives at the early stages of a project, before converging on a final design. Exploring design alternatives and understanding their impact on building energy performance leads to better performing building solutions. Therefore, any automatic process that gives the designer options to explore more alternatives and make decisions based on building performance would be of great benefit. If we look at the aerospace and automotive industries, they have developed multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO) methods, which are resulting in a significant reduction in the design cycle time and thus promoting more design iterations which then leads to improved product performance. MDO methods have been successfully applied in these industries, but their application to architecture practice has been comparatively modest. With the advent of BIM, however, it is now easier to facilitate the adoption of practices from other industries. This paper compares MDO processes in the Architecture, Aerospace and Automotive industries based upon data gathered on recent projects in each industry. It then reviews how iterative design and MDO process formalizes problem solving and coordination among groups working on the design of complex engineering systems. Finally, this paper investigates the feasibility of using BIM to facilitate an iterative design and MDO process which can result in the improvement in the number of design iterations of a building project
Lighting offices with LEDs: A study on retrofitting solutions
Global energy consumption is rising and the relative contribution of lighting in buildings to that total is also increasing. In offices, the dominant form of lighting is fluorescent, but this will soon be surpassed in terms of performance by LED lighting, which are already starting to be more widely used. Considering that most buildings and offices are of older building stock, this presents a great opportunity for making energy savings by using more efficient light sources within offices. This thesis investigates the application of LEDs as a retrofitting solution to existing fluorescent lighting systems and assesses their potential to provide an equivalent lighting environment with no adverse effects on performance and investigates their impact on space conditioning load demands and CO2e emissions on a range of case study buildings in the UK.
Savings in lighting cannot only be made through reduced electrical consumption, but also through space conditioning loads, by reduced lighting heat gains. Currently used lighting technology is reaching its limit of performance, whereas LEDs offer the potential to meet energy saving targets with their rapidly improving performance.
LEDs emit most of the heat generated to the back of a luminaire, rather than directly to the occupied space and this can lead to reduced heat gains and thus savings on space cooling demand loads, in addition to the electrical savings due to higher efficacies, for operating them.
In this thesis, simulation software were reviewed that would allow for the lighting specification of custom LED replacement luminaires and assessment of their thermal performance. Methodologies were developed on simulating their light output and designing custom LED replacement luminaires with the use of RADIANCE, thus providing a novel use for this extensively used and validated software. For validation purposes a test room was used where custom LED replacement luminaires were fitted and measured for their performance, where good agreement in predicted and measured results was found.
A visual performance study was also conducted using a range of age groups, to ascertain if there is a difference in task based performance on paper and VDU screens between fluorescent lighting and LED lighting, in an office environment. Subjective opinions on preference between the two light sources was also investigated.
An assessment of space conditioning load demands was performed on five case study buildings, where custom LED luminaires were specified to retrofit the existing fluorescent lighting. Results showed lighting levels and distribution in each building could be replicated with good agreement, offering a cooling load demand reduction, however with an increase in heating load demand. In terms of CO2e emissions, the use of LED lighting instead of fluorescent also proved to be beneficial, providing reductions in emissions
Complex networks and simulation strategies: An application to olive fruit fly dispersion
In this work a study for the role of different environmental factors to the evolution of olive fruit fly, via an appropriate network of population traps is given. More explicitly, the olive fruit fly is a parasitic insect that infests olive groves in many countries. Through the use of a network of traps a simulation model was developed and used to simulate the dispersion of olive fruit fly inside a real olive grove for different environmental factors, such as different starting areas of olive fruit fly presence, different temperature sets as well as different drifting distances. Results showed that the level of infestation of the grove was not dependent on the limited areas the olive fruit fly emerged but on the drifting distance a fly could travel per day
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The role of extended realities in heritage buildings representation
Architectural visualisation has been developing over the year to improve the representation of buildings and their contexts to the public. It achieved a long journey from manual drawings to photography to digital 2D and 3D representation, until it reached the era of extended realities (XR), which allowed unprecedented immersive and interactive engagement.
Extended reality applications represent a unique opportunity for the visualisation of heritage buildings on many stages; from the early design phase, through the construction and facility management phases, to the education and cultural tourism applications. This paper aims to explore the wide range of state of the art XR applications, investigate their aspects
and variations, and study their potentials, challenges, and limitations for the built heritage sector
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Regulating for climate change related overheating risk in dwellings
There is broad scientific consensus supporting the link between CO2 emissions and climate change. In cool and temperate climates such change is predicted to result in (among other impacts) warming ambient temperatures. As in recent years buildings in such locations have been increasingly optimised for heat retention (through regulations and standards), a warming climate has the potential to have a significant impact on the built environment and there is already evidence of overheating in new and recently constructed buildings.
Regulations in the built environment are largely designed to address issues of health and safety. In recent times however, such regulations have increasingly sought to incorporate issues related to energy efficiency while being used to implement national carbon reduction targets at the building scale. Arguably, building regulations remain focused on the ‘point of handover’ or near term performance, which given the uncertainty associated with predictions (such as climate change, occupant behaviour or technological change) is understandable. Such an approach however, in a situation where the current existing stock is seen as a major barrier to carbon reduction, risks buildings delivered today becoming prematurely obsolete due to the impacts of climate change.
Current overheating risk assessments in building regulations may not be appropriate as they are largely based on historic climate data. There remains a role however for regulations and standards that take account of the potential impacts of climate change. Building upon earlier research by the authors that demonstrates the potential magnitude of the overheating risk for UK dwellings, this paper suggests a risk based regulatory approach to overheating assessment based on climate change predictions while incorporating a requirement for adaptation planning. The approach put forward is based on semi-detached dwellings, built to new and emerging standards and regulations and aims to ensure that short term efficiency is not compromised for long term performance and comfort, thus minimising the potential for premature obsolescence related to overheating