Building information modeling in support of sustainable design and construction

The use of building information modeling (BIM) has provided a means of increasing total project quality, providing accurate quantity take-offs, and improving scheduling, consequently diminishing total project contingencies and costs. Although BIM is a recent development, a lot of research has been conducted in order to further enhance the capabilities of BIM in design and construction. However, there has been very little research done so far on the effect that BIM has on sustainable construction practices. Hence, the goal of this research is to investigate the perceptions of the use of BIM for sustainable design and construction among designers and constructors. A survey was developed and administered through the Internet to determine the existing trends of BIM application in general as well as its use as a tool in sustainable design and construction. The survey results indicated that although the majority of the respondents believed that sustainable design and construction practices were of importance within their company, most still believed that sustainability was not a primary application of BIM and that project coordination and visualization were instead more important. Although BIM is perceived as a multidisciplinary tool, problems with interoperability continue to persist among the various BIM applications in the industry. In terms of project delivery methods, the majority of the survey respondents believed that design/build and integrated project delivery (IPD) are the optimal project delivery methods to integrate BIM as a sustainability tool. Although BIM is still a recent development, as more design and construction professionals understand the potential benefits offered through its use, BIM will become a vital tool for sustainable design and construction.