BIM and FM in the Real World

It has been over a year since the UK Government mandated BIM Level 2 and COBie for their
centrally procured projects and, on the back of this, the industry acceptance of BIM for FM has
changed dramatically since. This is both encouraging and relieving as we at EcoDomus have
been promoting the benefits of Lifecycle BIM (or ‘BIM for FM’ as some call it) for around eight
years, which continues to be a wonderful and enlightening journey.
We spent the first few years working with “bleeding edge” customers, then “early adopters”, and
now the time has come for the mainstream users to adopt these advanced but continually refined
BIM practices for the whole asset lifecycle.
Given our track record I am now very pleased to present two case studies, both from the “early
adopter” users of EcoDomus. These are the fearless ones who did not ask questions such as “who
else is using it?” because they understood the concept and the technology value intrinsically. As
a result, they are nowadays more advanced than the average industry player on their journey to
the promised land of ever more efficient and effective facility development, construction, and
operations management.
Case Study 1: Sydney Opera House
In 2013, Sydney Opera House embarked on a project to introduce a long-term Building
Information Management Interface solution for the building and site. Including an asset
management (AM) & facility management (FM) interface for this UNESCO listed architectural
icon of the 20th century. As the building was designed to last for two hundred and fifty years, the
need for a document management system for building related information was paramount.
The foundation of the Sydney Opera House BIM Interface is that it will be a self-hosted web
based interface, that will link a constantly maintained geo-spatially accurate model of the exiting
building and site to the major engineering documentation, maintenance and building
management and control systems (BMCS). The primary interface component of this system will
be the 3D model, and the BIM interface solution will be a one-stop ‘single source of truth’ for all
regular building operational requirements, as well as ongoing maintenance, developmental works
and projects.
As this was quite a new venture, a budget was set on general advice from the industry ($450K
AUD). When the proposals were received from the market, naturally there was a wide range of
quoted prices, which were typically dependent on the skill of the consortium tendering and their
experience in delivering a tailored system. However, there were a number of offers within the
budget range, and the timeline related to this endeavour is shown.
The Timeline:
1Q 2013 – Expression of Interest Stage - International search for solution providers completing a
set of 250 qualitative/ quantitative questions.
4Q 2013 – Tender for the research, preparation and delivery of a detailed specification document
detailing the Sydney Opera House BIM Interface – the Technical Specification.
4Q 2014 – Tender for supply of Sydney Opera House BIM Interface implementation.
3Q 2015 – Contract Awarded to the consortium (EcoDomus, AECOM, BIM Academy).
4Q 2016 – Stage 1 “Retrieval of Information” is rolled-out.
The owner (the Sydney Opera House Trust) requested that the successful short-listed parties will
form consortium’s as Sydney Opera House believed that not one company alone would be able
to deliver their specific requirements. The shortlisted twenty one parties fell into three distinct
groups:
1) Specialist BIM consultants
2) Solution providers
3) AEC organizations.
Six developed consortia tendered for the final stage of the project. The Sydney Opera House
Trust then engaged with the lead company of the consortium (AECOM), which was determined
by the Consortium members. The members then had agreements in place with the lead that
reflected the contract of the lead to the principal. EcoDomus software platform was selected as
the main BIM FM interface.
It helped that BIM principles and deliverables had been enacted into Sydney Opera House
construction project work since 2010, with 3D scanning, photogrammetry and point cloud
technologies having been utilised since 2002. This project leveraged these facts.
Current project protocol required point cloud scanning to be undertaken as part of the project
establishment. Supplemental areas where needed and a point cloud/converted model (to Sydney
Opera House requirements) was to be delivered as part of the “work as executed” stage of project
completion.
A BIM implementation team was developed within Sydney Opera House to lead the process and
this has now expanded to a team of six staff that will support this ongoing initiative. This
comprises of:
 1x Building Strategy Manager (lead)
 1 x BIM Implementation Manager
 1 x BIM Model Manager
 1 x BIM Modeler
 1 x BIM Building Auditor
 1 x BIM Librarian.
The core BIM interface team regarding strategy and implementation is supported by the Model
Manager and the building auditor and modeler, who have responsibility for the Revit model
which is the base of the BIM4FM model geometry, room & asset ID system and external
contract team.
Regarding the BIM ownership, Sydney Opera House, as the owner of the complex, has one
simple rule; whatever is developed for Sydney Opera House belongs to Sydney Opera House.
Early stakeholder engagement included the development team who instigated the project. The
development of the technical specification (by the UK’s BIM Academy) included multiple
interviews with in-house individuals as well as the teams that would be the hands on users of the
final system.
At the time of writing this article, Sydney Opera House and EcoDomus are proudly working
together on adding more functionality, integrations, and deploying the solution for a larger
number of internal Sydney Opera House users.
Case Study 2: USA Government Services Administration (GSA) at Camden Courthouse
In 2011 the GSA funded its largest BIM pilot project to date, during which the value of BIM
technology would be thoroughly tested in the facilities management phase of the building life
cycle. Consequently, the BIM pilot project at the Delaware Valley Field Office (Camden
Courthouse complex) ably demonstrated that BIM technology enhances facilities management,
and resulted in a more widespread adoption of mobile BIM technology that building mechanics
and managers are now using to better operate the facility.
In short, BIM information comfortably supports the day-to-day planning necessary to ensure that
the facility operates at peak efficiency, which also reduces environmental impact and costs.
EcoDomus won the government tender and deployed its industry-leading software solutions
including Mobile BIM for Work Orders, integrated BIM with GSA’s CMMS (at that time it was
Corrigo, now GSA uses IBM Maximo) and, with the Building Automation System (Automated
Logic) using advanced integration with EnergyPlus (energy simulation software). EcoDomus
provided an interface to overlay the actual building sensors’ data over the data received from the
energy simulation software, to better identify areas of under-performance.
After two years of using EcoDomus, GSA project managers analysed the Return on Investment
and the results showed that the payback period was around 2 years.
One of the several areas where GSA identified savings and intangible benefits included a project
to divide a library from one room into two separate rooms, requiring a trace of HVAC system
above the ceiling. The building not only contained abandoned equipment above the ceiling but
the drawings were not available, nor trusted, to identify the location of the existing system. By
working with EcoDomus BIM the GSA reported a 75% time saving, from a task that would have
typically taken eight hours to trace now only taking two.
Tenant satisfaction was improved, so demonstrated by reports of the repeated clogging of kitchen
sink drains. It was not easy to identify the location of the drain piping with untrusted drawings,
which could have required monthly snaking of drain or the partial destruction and then patching
of a wall (thousands of dollars). The problem was solved by measuring the length of the snake
where it hits the clog and finding the location in the BIM by applying that length to the piping in
the model.
A reduction in the hours applied to routine facility maintenance operations was demonstrated.
For example, lights are identified on electric panels but not on the actual lights and not on
drawings that are readily available, if available at all. The BIM contains the names of the lights
which are accessible by simply tapping on them on the iPad. The fixing or repair of lights can be
performed without the risk of interrupting federal trials in federal court rooms (as shutting the
lights off during a trial is very bad and results in the extreme dissatisfaction of the Judges).
Previously staff would have worked after normal operating hours to fix/repair lights can now
perform these tasks during normal operating hours.
Product data searches have been eliminated. This has been achieved by:
 No need for physical binders
 No need to walk to mechanical room where binders located or need to call 2nd
engineer to walk to mechanical room where binders located,
 No need to search through catalog of binders with no uniform organisational and
labeling system (binders have been delivered from initial project delivery and
multiple Repair and Alterations projects over decades of building's existence.)
 Savings 20 to 40 minutes per instance. 10 instances per month, 120 instances per
year.
 3-6 hrs/month
 36-72 hrs/year

Identification of the location of non-visible building systems has been eliminated:

 No need to read paper and electronic 2D drawings,
 No need to walk to the drawing room where paper and digital drawings are located, or the
need to call a 2nd engineer to walk to mechanical room where the drawings are located.
 Savings 1 -2 hour per instance. 2 instances per month, 24 instances per year.
 2-4 hrs/month
 48- 96 hrs/year

After several years of doing business in relation to BIM for FM, EcoDomus are proud to have
accumulated an unmatched experience in deploying Lifecycle BIM solutions for the leading
facility owners around the world. With clients like Google, Disney, USA Govt, Singapore Govt,
Stanford University, Harvard University plus many airports, hospitals and industrial facilities
and many more.
It is wonderful to see the industry-wide adoption of the best BIM practices occurring and we
believe that 2018 will be the year of “crossing the chasm”, when the industry laggards will
finally jump aboard the adoption bandwagon.