September 11, 2009

The Architecture Engineering Construction (AEC) industry is at present increasingly looking at ways to prevent waste, reduce costs, improve productivity and create positive results. In a situation like this, Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) is coming up fast as an effective means of organizing project teams to achieve a lean construction.

Building Information Modeling (BIM), on the other hand, plays a significant role in the IPD process. It enhances communication between members of the AEC industry involved in building projects.

IPD is used to create digital images. These images accurately depict every aspect of a construction project. Thus IPD enables simulation of real-world performance and the operations of facilities. IPD offers a collaborative effort. It facilitates integration of the project team members. The owner, architect, engineers, construction managers and subcontractors usually constitute the project team.

BIM supports the efforts of IPD for ensuring a lean project delivery. It enables integration of design and input from the involved parties. Such parties include engineers, architect and other trades involved in the process. BIM creates an intelligent virtual model of the project. With the help of inputs from all relevant parties, such a model facilitates the installation and managing of a building facility.

The BIM technology can be used in a variety of domains. Major players in the BIM industry are utilizing the technology in an innovative way to come up with effective building solutions. Sougato Banerjee, Project Manager at Pinnacle Infotech, a market leader in BIM solutions, said, “Clash coordination (through BIM) eliminates field generated change orders and saves cost.” He holds that BIM reduces time to solve field generated issues and eliminate unnecessary delay. He also pointed out that prefabrication can be done by BIM to reduce cost and time. BIM also allows accurate quantity take-off which reduces wastage and makes scope for construction scheduling and monitoring the project which again reduce time as well as cost, according to him. “Our clients have reported reduction in costs by 10% - 15% using 3D co-ordination and documentation,” said Mr Banerjee.

BIM offers effective coordination and communication facilities. These help contractors execute a huge portion of their work in fabrication facilities off the job site. The outcome of such prefabrication practices are reduced waste and expense, as well as faster installation. The process also offers a more secure job site, as bulk of the work is done in a workspace that is more organized and controlled.

The construction industry is greatly advancing by using IPD and BIM. This is mainly due to the fact that BIM and IPD make it easier to predict and achieve high-quality outcomes. BIM is proving to be a great help for IPD. This is the reality today everywhere in the industry. The result is better teamwork.

One important feature of this collaboration is that it involves sharing information much earlier in the process than was the practice in the past. In the traditional process of project delivery, selection of subcontractors follows the designing, documentation and agency review. The selection takes place just before construction. However, the process is different in case of integrated delivery. Here, selection of subcontractors is completed during the conceptualization phase of the project.

To sum up, IPD allows utilization of the talent, experience and input of project team members to achieve the best results. It also decreases waste and maximizes efficiency, thereby increasing value for the owner. Thus, IPD reduces delivery time and increases project viability.

References:

http://www.tradelineinc.com/reports/0A03D1C0-2B3B-B525-85702BCEDF900F61#story
http://www.bdcnetwork.com/article/ca6673453.html

Description:

This article reviews how the BIM technology is helping the process of Integrated Project Delivery to streamline project delivery and increase productivity.

Useful Links:

http://www.pinnaclecad.com/bimServices.html
http://www.pinnaclecad.com/index.html

Company Information:

Pinnacle Infotech Solutions is the market leader in the Building Information Modeling industry. The company's core competency lies in solving complex problems in the AEC domain. Pinnacle has been thrice selected among the top 50 IT innovators by Nasscom, the premier trade body and the chamber of commerce of the IT-BPO industries in India.

Company Address:

Pinnacle Infotech Inc.,
9950,Westpark Dr., Suite 205,Houston, TX 77063

Website: http://www.pinnaclecad.com/

E-mail: info@pinnaclecad.com

Contact Number:

Toll Free : 888 876 8783, Cell : 832 283 6628, Phone : 713 780 2135, Fax : 713 780 8784