WIESBADEN, Germany -- The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' implementation of building information modeling systems - better known as BIM - has arrived in Europe. The Corps requires BIM to be used for many projects in its various mission areas and across its divisions, and that number is increasing steadily.
The Europe District has begun requiring German government construction agencies, or bauAfA$mter, to use the system on a limited basis. However, as with any technology adoption process, the District has to take the implementation slower than its counterparts because of its physical location in Germany.
"It isn't really correct to say that BIM is completely new to Europe," said Jim Noble, Engineering Branch chief for the District. "Many German firms in private industry are on board with BIM. The challenge for us is that many architects the bauAfA$mter uses do not have much experience with BIM."
Right now, the District has two trial projects requiring the use of BIM - a child development center at Landstuhl and a youth services center at Katterbach. The simplicity of these buildings' structure make them good pilot projects, said Joseph McKenna, Europe District BIM manager.
"They are one-story buildings with fairly standard systems and project scope is fixed. As the BauAfA$mter and designers become more familiar with BIM, the projects selected will be progressively more complicated leading up to medical facilities - one of the most complex types of buildings," he said. "The more complicated the building, the more important it is to use BIM."
Two clinics - one in Vilseck and one in Katterbach - are also using BIM by customer request. The expectation from the customer is savings in time and effort during design and construction. After completion, the BIM model will be used in facility maintenance, McKenna said.
It will take time to fully incorporate BIM into the Europe District construction process due to the legal process outlined in ABG 75, an agreement between the U.S. and German governments that defines how construction works are accomplished in Germany.
"Our job now is to get together with our partners, agree on some parameters, starting points and interpretations and move forward. We're doing just that," Noble said.
District employees are receiving training on the new system. A recent five-week training session included architects and mechanical, electrical and structural engineers, and District officials plan on having more training in the near future.
"Right now we're focusing on getting the designers up to speed before we move on to reviewers, who will eventually see BIM models as part of package submittals," McKenna said. "There is a common misconception that BIM is just a computer program - BIM is a process. The program doesn't just show a 3-D model - we've had that capability with CAD - this is smart 3-D. It's a composition now. It shows exactly what a wall is made of and the volume of material."
McKenna said the real benefit of incorporating BIM into the District is more than just money savings. Not only does BIM give designers a direct translation into the construction contract, the building owners have all of that information electronically rather than in stacks of manuals making easier to access.
"The real benefit is that customers will be able to maintain their buildings more efficiently," he said. "Now you can tie BIM into other databases that will tell the building manager when maintenance needs to occur, rather than letting problems happen first and then fixing it. It allows for preventative maintenance which translates into cost and labor savings."
For now, McKenna said he and other BIM managers around the District are tracking the pilot projects closely through design, construction and completion to ensure the information is being input correctly.
"The whole process saves money. Now we just have to get everyone in the District up to speed with the system so we can continue to integrate more parts of the process into our projects," he said. "It won't be an easy transition, but we were able to make the transition from drawing on paper to CAD, so I think we'll be able to make this transition."
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