GEOBIM Adoption: Benefits, Challenges & Return on Investments
GEOBIM is the latest approach to fill the gap between GEO and BIM.
Over the last few years, an integrated calculated approach has come forward in the global construction industry wherein different geospatial technologies along with BIM, i.e. GEOBIM solutions, are being used across the construction lifecycle. This latest technique is being used by various developed countries and some of the developing countries are also looking to get the benefits of GEOBIM. A closer look at the benefits achieved in its use and the challenges that it helped overcome will increase a better understanding of the concept and the practicality of its use.
You can even Integrated various other platforms like Drones etc for various purposes like Orthomapping or Aerial Survey, ( Drone Mapping), Drone Videography etc.
Geospatial Media & Communications in its latest market intelligence report GEOBIM Market in AEC Industry brings forth an analysis of 350 construction projects wherein integrated geospatial and BIM solutions were used. The report highlights the benefits derived from using GEOBIM solutions, quantifies the return on investment that can be achieved using GEOBIM solutions and services in both small and large scale projects and also brings forth the major challenges which are addressed by GEOBIM solutions during the construction lifecycle.
Atom Aviation is among the few companies in India which are using this latest technique in construction Industry.
Major Benefits
This integrated use of BIM solutions along with different geospatial technologies have resulted in yielding quite a few major benefits at different phases of construction lifecycle for AEC projects. They can be broadly divided into four main categories:
Time Efficiency: GEOBIM integration helps construction project owners to save time across the construction lifecycle, be it the planning and design stage, construction stage or the operations & maintenance stage. AURA Apart Hotel in Ukraine designed by Da Vinci Group and Vatmanstudio is one of the prime examples of one such project wherein integrated use of BIM along with LiDAR scanning solutions resulted in reducing the design time effectively by 10%. Graphisoft (Nemetschek) was the primary technology provider for this project.
Cost Efficiency: Benefits in terms of cost saving in different stages of lifecycle of a construction project are defined under cost efficiency. Heilongjiang Construction Industry Modernization Demonstration Park in China is one such project where integrated use of BIM along with GNSS and GIS technologies helped save as much as US$ 0.65 Million construction costs. For this project, the stakeholders used the product portfolio of Bentley Systems, inclusive of ContextCapture, MicroStation, OpenBuildings Designer, OpenRoads, ProjectWise, ProStructures & STAAD – across the construction lifecycle.
Material Efficiency: Efficient 3D visualization and designing, and climate modelling using GEOBIM integration helps in lowering the degree of material consumption helping the stakeholder to decide the materials most feasible to use in a construction project. Benefits like these are clubbed under material efficiency. Prime example of such a project is the prestigious Shanghai Tower in China designed by Shanghai Tower Construction & Development Co., Ltd. Autodesk’s BIM solutions were used in the project which reduced the use of building material by 32% in the construction process, and also helped in natural energy conservation.
Labor Productivity: Different project management and collaborative software helps in achieving efficient productivity by lowering manual labor. The use of geospatial technologies helps in efficient labor allocation and results in lowering the overall labor need for construction projects. Integrated use of BIM along with GNSS helped eliminate 20000 hours of manual labor in New Bridge Project over the Richmond River in Australia designed by Landlease Engineering.
GEOBIM Benefits
Source: Geospatial Media Analysis
Geospatial Media’s analysis suggests that the maximum benefit derived from using integrated geospatial and BIM solutions is an increase in productivity due to time efficiency, followed by cost efficiency. Benefits in terms of material efficiency and labour productivity are comparatively less than the other two; however, it is significant.
Also Read: GEOBIM for Digital Cities – Integration of technology for public services
Return on Investments
Geospatial Media’s analysis to quantify the return on investments of using GEOBIM solutions and services in construction projects yielded interesting results.
In case of small scale projects, integrated GEOBIM adoption leads to an average design time saving of 22.2% and approximately about 45 days of construction work. For large scale projects, GEOBIM solutions helps in saving approximately 90 days of construction time, which is a huge cost saving for so many companies.
There are many Drone manufacturing companies in India which can integrate drone with BIM.
Major Challenges
Geospatial Media’s analysis shows GEOBIM solutions help to address challenges related to the geography of the construction site and the seismic activities, i.e. challenges pertaining to geotechnical investigations followed by challenges related to process management which includes those faced by construction managers in aligning different processes of a construction lifecycle.
One such project is the Chenab Bridge which once completely constructed, is set to be the world’s tallest railway bridge, where integrated use of BIM solutions provided by Bentley Systems along with the use of drones have successfully helped in combating challenges faced due to complex mountainous terrain and highly active seismic activities. The Nagpur Maha Metro 5D BIM project is another example where integrated GEOBIM solutions helped in overcoming lack of coordination and collaboration among the different institutions and agencies involved in the project.
Furthermore, GEOBIM solutions also help to address problems associated with defining the structural integrity of construction projects. Challenges originating from fixed and time scheduling of plans for different phases of the lifecycle of a project is also another challenge solved by the utilization of GEOBIM solutions. Problems regarding legal constraints are yet to find a proper solution using this integrated adoption and have not proved to be fruitful in most of the projects.
GEOBIM challenges
Source: Geospatial Media Analysis
For further details about integrated GEOBIM solutions and their major benefits in the AEC Industry and more insights regarding the GEOBIM Market please refer to the GEOBIM Market in AEC Industry Report.
