A BIM-based business process model to support systematic retrofit of buildings

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change. The building and construction sectors are responsible for 39% of energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions globally and have a key role to play in reducing global warming. Most emissions occur during building operation, accounting for 28% of all energy-related CO2 emissions for space heating, cooling and lighting, whit the remaining 11% coming from materials and construction processes. Approximately two-thirds of the global building area that exists today will still exist in 2050 and over 40% of the European residential stock was built before the 1960s when building regulations on energy efficiency were very limited. Currently, building retrofits affect only 0.5-1.0% of the annual building stock, indicating a slow pace of change for the building sector. The European Commission seeks to double the rate of building retrofits by 2030, i.e. about 35 million buildings need to be renovated by 2030. Therefore, in order to meet the emission reduction target, of at least 55%, set by the European Commission, a significant increase in the rate and effectiveness of energy efficiency retrofits of existing building and the generation and procurement of renewable energy is required. Academic literature shows that several barriers prevent the retrofitting of existing buildings and the implementation of energy efficiency measures in buildings. The research presented here examines the potential to overcome these retrofit barriers by developing a novel guide that supports systematic procedures relating to building retrofit. The proposed workflow combines the benefits of Building Information Modelling (BIM) with the Business Process Modelling (BPM) technique. BIM is used for its capacity to create and manage information along the full life cycle of a building. BPM optimises the retrofit workflow by providing all relevant stakeholders with (i) the instruments that facilitate a better understanding of their roles and responsibilities in the retrofit process and (ii) the technological framework and data needed to efficiently implement BIM within a project. A BIM-based Renovation Plan was developed for retrofit existing buildings using the BPM, a graphical language that was adopted by the National BIM standards for the BIM implementation in industry and that was also ratified as ISO9510. The BIM Renovation Plan is then tested in four real world pilot projects, demonstrating its effectiveness across different retrofit contexts. The results show that the proposed workflow is versatile and adaptable to different project outcomes, improving the quality of retrofit interventions. Moreover, it enhanced the management of information throughout the entire building retrofit lifecycle. In fact, stakeholders have access to clear and up-to-date data, reducing errors and misunderstandings during project implementation.

Publisher

University of Galway

Rights

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

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Collections

University of Galway Theses (PhD Theses)