BIM will be a route to export growth for UK companies, as projects in developing countries look to import design and construction services, a new report concludes. But it urges the government to consolidate the UK’s lead in BIM by helping to develop European-wide procurement standards and to get tougher with BIM suppliers dragging their feet in getting systems to talk to each other – so-called “interoperability.”
The 100-page report, Growth through BIM, has been funded by the government and published by the Construction Industry Council. The report was written by Richard Saxon, former chairman of BDP and a BIM Growth Ambassador.
The report says: “BIM-based working has become essential for international work. Almost all pre-construction work is done in BIM, for its speed, quality-control, presentation polish and risk reduction.”
Currently about £7.6bn is earned by export, around 1% of contracting work, 4% of consultancy and 10% of materials and products business. It says the extent for BIM to help serve this market, however, will depend on the uptake of BIM across the world.
The report also extolled the benefits of BIM to drive the UK economy: “BIM adoption throughout project cycles from inception to occupancy represents a significant opportunity for economic growth, through the removal of risk and time, and therefore cost, and the enhancement of service provided.” It says that BIM would impact on work that accounts for 15% of GDP.
“BIM will also enable returning demand after the recession to be met with less inflationary pressure,” it adds.
More needs to be done
Speaking to CM Saxon said the government should be applauded for setting Level 2 BIM as the mandated standard that companies should reach by 2016 to enable them to work on public contracts. But more needed to be done to ensure that this can happen, said Saxon, particularly around developing interoperability standards so different parts of the supply chain can work across different platforms. “The government has decreed that only systems that can produce information in COBIE can be used, but suppliers don’t seem to be working as swiftly to towards that as they might.”
Saxon said he would also like to see the UK take the lead in developing a European-wide BIM standard for products that are overlaid on the new CE markings for products, being introduced this year by the EU.
These require product manufacturers to supply more information about the carbon aspects of products. “It would make sense for this to be inlaid into a digital model of the product,” said Saxon.
In terms of developing BIM, he said: “There is clearly more to be done to complete Level 2 BIM, but the government could pick up the world baton and support UK exports by starting the debate on Level 3, through things like conferences and awards.”
The report also recommended that the Building Regulations, health andmsafety, and planning processes should be reviewed to see if a system similar to that in Singapore can be used in the UK. There, BIM is submitted for checking by computer against the regulations and rule-based planning policies. Errors or issues are flagged and once cleared, the project is considered passed for construction. Final processing takes a matter of an hour.
“Clearly BIM is going to have huge impact on a wide range of professions in the built environment than more people recognise and we have a huge educational task to perform,” said Saxon.
- Two new technical support apprenticeships in Town Planning and Building Control were launched this morning by CIC chief executive Graham Watts.
