Elemental

BIM (Building Information Modelling) has long been the way I think the industry ought to work. It just seems so logical to me. The premise is simple – build an intelligent 3D model of a building which can be exported and manipulated by various designers, including architects, structural engineers and building services engineers. This model is in effect a virtual prototype of the proposed building. Various proposals can be tested in the virtual model, resulting in an actual building whose vagaries are well understood before a brick is laid.

Sounds great on paper, but the reality is that this is still a long way off. What does the industry need to change in order to further this technology, which exists today but is grossly underexploited?

One problem is that the information in CAD is not suitable for direct export into BIM (this article explains well). IES are hoping to have moved one step closer. They have teamed up with AutoCAD Revit to enable BIM more easily.

What worries me slightly is the claim:

This direct link means the user can run a variety of analyses, without needing specialised skills, separate analysis packages or separate models for each analysis. Greatly increasing the quality and speed of the technical feedback this development enables building designers to examine the implications of alternative design strategies at the touch of a button and use the tools for sustainable design rather than just plant sizing.

A nice philosophy, but beware of putting software in the hands of those without specialised skills. You still need to know how to interpret results, even if you no longer need to be a master at 3D building modelling, something which Kathy Sierra* touched on here.

But does BIM actually reflect reality?  I don’t think so.  Do you know anyone who uses Hevacomp or IES to it’s full potential? Or are you more likely to come across engineers who use a mish-mash of pencil and paper, excel spreadsheets with a little bit of hevacomp and perhaps a little IES thrown in? This dissonance between what the software is capable of doing and what the user actually wants it to do is probably part of the problem.  Users see the software as too complex for what they want to do and so don’t want to overcome the hurdle of learning a new way of doing things.  There’s some great writing out there on this topic including this (old) article from Jeffrey Phillips :

 So the conundrum is, we’ve got to design for lowest common denominator in a user interface, while providing as much functionality as is necessary for the customer to be interested and excited in the application.  Unfortunately, the users of applications are rarely the buyers of applications, so we need a better method to get the proposed user interface in front of the actual users as often as possible.

So is the problem with the software or with the users?  It’s probably a bit of both.  Another Kathy Sierra’s post tries to explain some of the reasons from the users’ perspective.

A final word from Jeffrey Phillips again:

The real rationale is that requesting a new feature is costless. A customer or prospect can ask for features all day long. However, the user interface and its complexity has tremendous cost, since most people are lazy and don’t want to think – and good design should not require them to think overly much. In fact good design should lead a user to the right conclusions and actions without a lot of training or support help, regardless of the number of features. What people are really saying is: give me the features I want, but simplify the interface to make it even easier to use, so I don’t have to receive training, or support this application once we start using it.

This is a topic I’ll be returning to.  I hope BIM is the future, for lots of reasons, but for the minute there are hurdles to overcome…

*Sadly, Kathy hung up her blogging boots back in April 2007 after a nasty cyber incident involving death threats.  Yikes.  I still miss her blog…

mel starrs Uncategorized Building Physics, Built Environment, CAD, Engineering, Jeffrey Phillips, Kathy Sierra, Productivity

In case you may have missed it, Architectural Record has started a blog, and it’s actually quite good.  Catching up with the archives, I found this gem on open plan offices.

Having been on the receiving end of some less than stellar office re-organisations and also involved (somewhat indirectly in the actual design decisions, but present at the discussions) in the construction of open plan offices, I can only agree with Suzanne Stephens’ conclusions:

It’s time another Probst came up with acoustically satisfying work environments—ones that companies can afford, and everyone will find truly distraction-free.

She also touches on another problem with open plan offices – storage space.  Can we come up with an acoustically satisfying space which also has enough space for the reference documents we all use?  One solution would be a dual screen arrangement (one screen for reference material, and one for actually composing drawings or documents or running software).  Of course, your desk would need to be large enough to hold both screens and then we would run the risk of supplying desks large enough to lay out an A1 (nevermind A0) drawing on. Can’t be going back to the good old days when we all had a drawing board and desk to ourselves, can we now? 

This may seem rather petulant, and although the ”happy worker is a productive worker” is refuted by some, I’m still a fan of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.  Given a comfortable environment, in which a worker feels their needs are being respected, they will be able to advance towards attaining cognitive and aesthetic needs – surely a goal if your business is engineering or architecture?

mel starrs Uncategorized Built Environment, Management, Productivity, Suzanne Stephens

The blogosphere have been saying it since day one, now the industry events circuit is catching up.  CIBSE have announced The Great Refurbishment Event: Making refurbishment a green opportunity scheduled for 24 October 2007 in London.

And in case we need reminding why existing buildings are key, Cyril Sweett estimate that by 2050, 60% of UK buildings will still predate 2006 Building Regs, with corresponding high fuel consumption and carbon emissions.  Barring a massive technological improvement in electricity generation at source, our only option is to address existing stock.

As I’ve said before, this is a lot less sexy than new build, but a necessary pill to swallow.

mel starrs Uncategorized Built Environment, Cyril Sweett, electricity generation, Green Building, London, Sustainability, United Kingdom

The AECB appears to be realigning it’s Carbon Lite program with CSH.  Press release in the latest newsletter states:

At the heart of the programme are three Steps to improved energy performance in buildings, which provide robust solutions to the CO2 targets at levels 4, 5 and 6 of the Code for Sustainable Homes. These steps offer extremely cost-effective ways of creating genuine CO2 emissions reduction in new buildings.

I had previously been confused as to why AECB seemed to be striking out on their own and they have been very critical of CSH in the past. Having facilitated a workshop on low energy standards in housing in UK, I am more than aware of the numerous competing standards and any paring down and rationalisation has to be applauded.

The AECB still seem to be a little militant in their approach though – I think they need to tone down the aggressive language, it’s not doing them any favours:

It is becoming increasingly clear that in the building sector, neither Government action nor Industry initiatives are leading to the level of regulatory reform or voluntary action needed to deliver a sustainable future for the UK, due to conflicting interests, ignorance of buildings’ actual energy performance and political uncertainty.

Independence may give them a licence to take a critical stance, but language like this is a turnoff.  IMO, better to say what can be done, than to point out what is wrong.  I’ll keep watching this space…

mel starrs Uncategorized actual energy performance, Built Environment, Green Building, Guidance Documents, improved energy performance, low energy standards, Sustainability, United Kingdom

No longer do you need to rely on a central marketing department to scan the OJEU (Official Journal of the European Union) for you – you can have it delivered to your inbox via RSS .  Tenders Electronic Daily (or TED) is available in 23 languages.  Feeds include Construction and Real Estate.

If you haven’t yet embraced RSS (why not?) don’t forget feedblitz can turn any RSS feed into an email, delievered to your inbox.  Just pop the feed url in the big orange box at the bottom of the front page and follow the instructions.

mel starrs Uncategorized Built Environment, European Union, Knowledge, Productivity, Projects, Resources

I came across this article (10 pages, pdf) from 1996 via RICS (Royal Institiute of Chartered Surveyors). The article is “Improving the quality of conceptual structural design: A neural network approach“, which no doubt sounds very dull to most readers.  Glutton for punishment, I forged ahead and found some nuggets in there (I’m actually looking for quotable references for the dreaded MBA dissertation).  My favourite was this:

over 80% of the overall cost of a project is determined by the first 20% of decisions taken

Those who have spent any time in training courses will recognise this as the Pareto principle.  This is simply the best argument I have ever heard for getting conceptual designers (structural engineers, building services engineers, etc) on board before those first 20% of decisions have been made.

mel starrs Uncategorized Built Environment, Engineering, neural network, Productivity, Resources, statistics

HEEPI (Higher Education Environmental Performance Improvement) have released a position paper on “Sustainable Laboratories for Universities and Colleges – Lessons from America and the Pharmaceutical Sector” (.doc, 29 pages). Although not a design code, it has some useful observations which will interest those involved in laboratory design, and outlines the Labs21 approach. Some points I have picked out:

• It is not unknown for laboratories to have a ten times greater energy consumption per square metre than offices
• Laboratories can account for 10% or more of floor space, and 20-30% of total energy consumption, in research-based universities
• it is very common for laboratories to have much higher consumption than their design specification – sometimes two or three times higher
• Up to 40-50% of electrical energy consumption in a typical laboratory is consumed by motors in the fans which pull air into the ventilation system, distribute it within the lab building, and expel it to the outside
• An additional 10-30% of total energy consumption can come from chilling air or water in order to cool spaces or equipment

The Labs21 approach intends to address some of these issues:

• Labs21 stresses the need for five key process features to achieve sustainable laboratories:
  • Integrated design
  • Setting of energy and environmental goals
  • Accurate profiling of operation
  • Incorporation of user perspectives
  • Commissioning as quality control

The Labs21 discussions suggested that there are five process, and five architectural/engineering, issues which need to be given greater weight by laboratory designers in Britain:

Process Issues

• More integrated and engineering-led design than at present
• Clear sustainability goals
• Greater involvement by a range of users and facilities staff
• More effective commissioning and evaluation
• Value engineering to minimise whole-life, rather than first, costs.

Technical Issues

• Low pressure drop design
• Rethinking fume cupboard ventilation systems, positioning and operating parameters
• Evidence based design parameters
• Modular solutions
• Effective controls.

Benchmarks such as BREEAM ‘Excellent’ are recommended:

“this is unlikely to be sufficient by itself, both because it only assesses the performance of the design as constructed rather than actual operating performance”

The HEEPI benchmarks are given below:

mel starrs Uncategorized Britain, Built Environment, electrical energy consumption, Energy, energy consumption, fume cupboard ventilation systems, News, Sustainability, Sustainable Laboratories, times greater energy consumption

edit: this was originally posted 22 January, but I fear there may have been a glitch and it has been marked as private.  Odd.  Anyway, here it is again…

Spotted via the IET headlines, this article in the Telegraph highlights the findings of a report in Energy Policy in December which criticises the fragmented approach the UK government has to meeting it’s carbon targets. I’ve hunted out the abstract to the report, but can’t put my hands on the full version. If anyone knows where I might find it, please let me know. It makes interesting reading and reminds us that carbon reduction is a complex issue (as David Attenborough reminded us last night in the BBC program ‘Climate Change: Britain under threat‘ (which you should be able to watch online soon)). I’ve posted the abstract of the report below for information (my emphasis in italics):

The role of energy efficiency in reducing Scottish and UK CO2 emissions Nick Kelly. Energy Policy. Kidlington: Dec 2006.Vol.34, Iss. 18; pg. 3505

Abstract
In 2003, the UK government launched its long-anticipated White Paper on energy, the centrepieces of which were ambitious targets for the production of electricity from renewable technologies and the long-term aspiration of a 60% reduction in UK greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. In the White Paper it was recognized that such a dramatic reduction in emissions will require significant changes in the way in which energy is produced and used. However there has been a general failure to recognize the fact that in order to meet emissions targets, the UK will have to significantly reduce its energy consumption; this is not helped by the general misconception in the UK that reductions in CO2 emissions will occur simply by increasing the production of electricity from renewable sources. Specifically, this paper highlights the current trends in renewables deployment and energy demand, with a specific focus on Scotland, where the authorities have set more ambitious renewables targets than the rest of the UK. As will be demonstrated in this paper, without energy demand reduction, the deployment of renewables alone will not be sufficient to curtail growth in UK CO2 emissions. This is illustrated using a case study of the Scottish housing sector; whilst this case study is necessarily local in scope, the results have global relevance. The paper will also address the magnitude of energy savings required to bring about a reduction in emissions and assesses the status of the policies and technologies that could help bring such reductions about.

mel starrs Uncategorized BBC, Britain, Built Environment, carbon, Climate Change, David Attenborough, electricity, Energy, energy consumption, energy demand, energy demand reduction, energy efficiency, energy savings, greenhouse gas emissions, Nick Kelly, renewable technologies, renewables, Scotland, Sustainability, UK government, United Kingdom