BIM for Construction Health and Safety

Stefan Mordue, Roland Finch

• Publisher: NBS
• Year: 2019
• eBook ISBN: 9781000705034
• Topic: Technologie et ingénierie
• Subtopic: Architecture générale

What is BIM and how does it affect the health and safety professional?

How are BIM technologies used on a practical level?

What opportunities are there for the use of BIM in the health and safety arena?

This concise and practical guide aims to answer all these questions and more. The health and safety role is evolving towards collaboration, structured data and sharing of information as BIM – the incarnation of these sensibilities - increasingly underpins construction practice. As the industry begins to see how these two topics can and should intersect this guide provides context and practical advice by explaining the basic principles of BIM, how it will shape the health and safety professional's role and what tools and processes will need to be embedded in the future. It also highlights the wealth of opportunities that BIM provides to improve health and safety standards and effective coordination – the means to exploit the potential of BIM.

01.
Introduction

Models are not new. Over the centuries, many landmark buildings would not have existed were it not for the use of models. If you care to visit, you can see Sir Christopher Wren’s ‘Great Model’ of St Paul’s Cathedral, now in the cathedral’s Trophy Room. It contains geometric information about the proposed construction, and is therefore an early Building Information Model (BIM).

Wren’s model took about ten months to design, between 1672 and 1673, and another two years to build. Crucially, however, it does not correspond with the finished building, so while it provides us with a fascinating insight into the ideas of the designer, it could only partially be used as an aid to construction, and since it is not an as-built record, it is practically useless in the post-construction phase. This is where the modern building information model comes into its own.

There are no accounts of injuries or fatalities during the construction of St Paul’s, but historically, the record is not good. The design team for the Empire State Building reputedly included an allowance – one death per floor – in their calculations for the project. In the event, only seven people lost their lives, which at the time was seen as a positive outcome. Specification is not new either. Nor is a requirement for health and safety. The ancient Babylonian law, the Code of Hammurabi, dating from around 1750 BC, contains the following general rule: ‘If a builder has built a house for a man, and has not made his work sound, and the house he built has fallen, and caused the death of its owner, that builder shall be put to death’.¹ Similarly, the Old Testament of the Bible states: ‘When you build a new house, make a parapet around your roof so that you may not bring the guilt of bloodshed on your house if someone falls from the roof’.²

But is it possible to use models to improve health and safety? And if so, how?

Chapter overview

The aim of this guide is to introduce the concept of BIM from the construction health and safety advisor’s viewpoint. In a construction context, this role is often associated with the implementation of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations (CDM Regulations) or, more generally, with the application of risk management techniques to the building process. However, there is potential and opportunity for the use of BIM technology well beyond these fields, as BIM applications may be used in all areas of workplace health and safety.

This guide is not exclusive to the health and safety advisor’s role (HSA), and is applicable to all core project roles working in a collaborative environment, such as designers, clients and contractors. It is relevant to practitioners and students alike.

We explore the idea that BIM is about a combination of processes, people and information – a means to effect collaboration and sharing of data among the project team – supported by information technology. BIM is of the utmost relevance to the HSA role, which is increasingly utilising shared and structured information in a variety of electronic formats.

This chapter covers the following:

• The scope of this guide
• BIM concepts
• BIM in the design process
• BIM in the Government Construction Strategy
• BIM for health and safety
• Government policy on health and safety regulation
• Who benefits from the introduction of health and safety information in BIM?
• Is BIM applicable to simple projects?

The scope of this guide

This guide looks at the various stakeholders, and their roles in construction health and safety, and BIM, with the focus on activities rather than specific job titles or membership of professional bodies.

Chapter 2 investigates the many opportunities for the HSA in the BIM world. Chapter 3 discusses the uses of health and safety information in the BIM environment, while chapters 4 and 5 consider the movement of data to and from the model, identifying the processes, and how, what and when information is transferred. These chapters discuss how the HSA can add to, view and access information from the model, in addition to the reporting and feedback of information.

The guide introduces the idea, highly relevant to HSAs, that just as their role is not confined to CDM but relates to the much wider health and safety aspects of a project, so BIM is not just about data collection but also change management and quality assurance.

This guide is also of interest to other members of the project team – designers, contractors, consultants, subcontractors and suppliers – who have much to gain from utilising the benefits BIM brings in producing safer projects.

Understanding the context

A number of recent trends demonstrate the changing landscape we are working in and place BIM in context for the HSA:

We have already seen a digital switchover happening in many other industries. We only have to think of vinyl records, tapes and CDs being replaced by MP3 digital downloads; videos and DVDs being replaced by streaming from the internet; and books being replaced by the E-reader. In many cases, digital sales are outstripping those of traditional media. Although there will always be some who remain steadfastly nostalgic for the past, we are clearly moving from a mind-set of ‘owning’ a physical copy of the data to an era where simply owning ‘access’ to data, information and services will become the norm.

• Communication and interaction via social networks and websites is on the increase. This will facilitate collaboration, online communities, and the use of multimedia applications for disseminating information and training.
• Design and construction is delivered in a variety of models, with information increasingly stored online and accessed remotely by the principal contributors and participants.
• The focus of learning and design has a greater emphasis than before on outcomes, competencies and measurable objectives, with object modelling and simulation a key part of this strategy.
• Information is becoming more personalised. As the particular needs and requirements of each party in the production supply chain are identified based on data and activity logging, that party will be able to filter the outputs so that information which is not relevant to them is discarded.
• As technologies and software develop and mature, there will be less of a reliance upon proprietary file formats, and an adoption of open-source formats. Well-managed construction data, shared across disciplines and running through the building life cycle, offers clear efficiencies and huge potential value to the client in both construction and maintenance. It important that the information is not held only in one piece of software or is held in a format that could face eventual depreciation.³
• The term ‘big data’ is a buzzword, which refers to data that is so large and complex that it needs to be handled by machines rather than humans. The production of data is increasing year on year. According to research by business solutions provider CSC, data production will be 44 times greater in 2020 than it was in 2009, and it is predicted that one third of all data will ‘live in’ or utilise Cloud technology. It is now cheaper than ever to processes and store data. However, the real advantage is in increased capacities to analyse it.

So, we are now moving from analogue to digital technologies and data is increasingly generated in structured spreadsheets. We need to adopt strategies and develop classification, filing and storage systems to harness this new world of big data, in order to access, retrieve and reuse it. This will allow us to realise the potential of BIM, in particular for health and safety purposes. The coordination process is still largely the same as it was, but new techniques, process and procedures will make it far more accessible.

What questions should we be asking?

In order to get the best from BIM for health and safety coordination, some important general questions need to be answered, including:

• What information can be gathered?
• How can it be translated into something useful, which adds value to the health and safety arena?
• What new techniques and processes will need to be adopted?
• What new skills are required?
• Can health and safety information be embedded into BIM - related information, such as in a COBie (Construction Operations Building information exchange) file?
• Does the same apply to pre-construction information – the Construction Stage Health and Safety Plan, or the Health and Safety File?
• What practical applications can be developed at each stage of the construction process to improve it, and how do the users of this information become part of the process and interact with the rest of the design team? One fundamental question that follows all the others is: What new opportunities does this present for HSAs – and others who are involved in the design team from a health and safety perspective?

BIM concepts

BIM is not a software package. It is an approach, which requires people to work within a process and share information – often using software. Its successful implementation relies on three main activities:

• Generating information
• Maintaining the information
• Using the information

Throughout a project, information is generated, checked and used at several key stages.

• Initially, a client brief is generated.
• At concept design stage, the design is checked against the brief and then developed.
• At tender stage, drawings, specifications and bills of quantities are issued.
• During construction stage, checks are made of the installation against the agreed contract requirements.
• At completion, details of the installation are handed to the project owner and user in the form of operation and maintenance manuals (O&M manuals).

In the world of BIM, these critical information-generation points are referred to as ‘data drops’. The level of detail produced at each drop must be relevant to the stage of project development.

In early forms of computer modelling, the data included in the model mainly comprised graphical representations of the kind previously found on drawings, with possibly the addition of materials-and-workmanship specifications. Some models were also adapted to include factors like labour and material resources, which allowed quantity surveyors to extract schedules of quantities, and calculate estimates of cost.

Contemporary models developed for BIM contain much more than geometric information. BIM has been described by the UK National Building Specification (NBS) as ‘A rich information model, consisting of potentially multiple data sources, elements of which can be shared across all stakeholders and be maintained across the life of a building from inception to recycling’.⁴ Health and safety information falls squarely into this category, and the technology now available presents many opportunities for the development of practical applications for this information.

In traditional documentation we would say it once, and in the right place; however, that still means it has to be located in a particular document and located by cross-reference. With BIM, the mantra is describe it once, and in the right place, to be able to use and update it many times. This move away from documents to data allows us to reassess past processes and begin to apply more rigorous checks to what we do (see Chapter 4).

BIM in the design process

Let us now turn to the design process, where we have seen the demise of the drawing board, giving way to the computer and the graphics tablet. Today, buildings are being modelled rather than drawn; the implications of this development are profound, and will result in considerable changes in our approach. Traditionally, 2D drawings were produced and viewed together to imply a 3D representation. Now, 2D drawings are an ‘output’ of a 3D model, relatively easily generated using computer graphics. However, unlike 3D CAD (computer-aided design), which results in a model confined to a single discipline without the integration of other disciplines’ models, BIM requires a much more collaborative approach.

Every member of the project team makes a contribution. The architect considers the appearance of the building, while the services and structural engineers consider their own specialist areas, but invariably they do it in isolation because that fulfils their own particular needs. Strictly speaking, each therefore represents only a partial model, and there is a need for all of these parts to be combined into a single ‘federated model’ that contains all the information needed to fully describe the building at each stage during its life cycle. Unfortunately, this has historically been restricted, due to limitations in technology, disagreements as to who provides and coordinates the data, and a number of potential contractual issues. However, Building Information Managem...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Note from the Association for Project Safety
• Note from Health and Safety Executive
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Dedication
• Chapter 1 Introduction
• Chapter 2 Opportunities for BIM and health and safety
• Chapter 3 Health and safety information within the BIM process
• Chapter 4 Interacting with the model
• Chapter 5 Working with information in the model
• Conclusion: What’s next for BIM and health and safety?
• Appendix: Case Study Hadlow College Rural Regeneration Centre
• Glossary
• Index