BIMin’ Guide to the Galaxy

How to create, launch and nurture your digital twins

Kimon Onuma, FAIA BIMis

THE center of the galaxy with unlimited geometry and information for: property, floors, ceilings, structural, mechanical, furniture, manufacturer, cost, and performance. But why stop there? Let’s add: people, name, position, phone number, last order from Amazon, the movies they watched on Netflix, friends on Facebook, almost everything goes into BIM. Well, that can cause problems! So that is pretty much what an ideal digital twin is, right? BIM is in the middle of the digital galaxy.

The One Digital Twin

The knee-jerk reaction is often: ‘Everything goes into a BIM?’ That used to be our thinking 30 years ago. However, we quickly realized that the model was bloated and impossible to manage, creating a new island with no connections. A perfect openstandard digital twin on one island is very lonely – primarily relying only on manual file transactions to import, export, and align. The question is, does every digital twin need to be exactly alike? Does the construction twin need to be the same as the asset management twin? They need to share the same information but not ALL the same data.

Digital twins today are often misinterpreted with the same logic: all the information and geometry mimicking the real world is replicated in ONE model. Likewise, the same conclusion can be made about Common Data Environments (CDEs). Conceptually this is correct as long as the single solution is not one application and super BIM (even if some vendors would like you to believe that). A digital twin is NOT one BIM. Instead, embrace the modern solution of interconnected platforms that use open data and BIM, which is application-independent. Own your data instead of surrendering it to the whims of one specific BIM application. Ask every technology vendor you work with to demonstrate how to:

• Get data into and out of their solution using industry-recognized, machinereadable, open standards.

• Use APIs to let their application exchange data and functionality with other applications. How difficult and costly is this to do?

If the response is vague, expensive, or proprietary. Then consider other solutions. Your choices are open with MANY new launches every year. Locking your data into specific BIM products is like creating movies and music libraries on VHS and cassette tapes.

Owners are Changing the Industry

Owners hold the purse strings and can drive industry change from their consultants, contractors, vendors, and standards organizations.

We have witnessed facility owners who have gone down a specific BIM path that eventually dead-ends because it did not account for future flexibility and new technologies and capabilities. We have also seen owners progress toward a digital twin universe by converting their analog data into machinereadable information using open standards. Their data is shared on a platform in a secure way. No single BIM application can cover the entirety of planning, design, construction, commissioning, maintenance, building operations, and assets that owners need.

Properly configured platforms can foster the exchange of information across many apps, just as our mobile devices simply share information for Amazon, Netflix, and Uber apps.

No single owner has conquered the entire digital galaxy, but here are noteworthy pioneers building data-driven platforms to support digital twins:

• California Community Colleges’ FUSION Platform uses web APIs for over eight million square meters and 5,000 buildings connected to Space Management, GIS, BIM, CMMS, and other systems. A very early implementation of digital twin data since 2011 makes this real-time data accessible and usable for more people..

• Los Angeles Community Colleges is the largest college district in the US, with a US $9.6 billion bond program. Linking 742 buildings on nine campuses to FUSION with their own BIM requirements, using the same information in asset and facility management and live data from web APIs across multiple applications.

• A series of projects with the National Institute of Building Sciences for the US Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense was influenced by the California Community Colleges. These owners publicly posted their hospital requirement data, which generated live digital twins of specific medical rooms, including equipment, modeled in real-time for their portfolio of over 21 Million SM of facilities.

• The US Department of State Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO) serves a US$71billion portfolio of embassies in 290 locations worldwide with 970 office buildings and 16,575 residences - Influenced by the Department of Veterans Affairs, OBO created digital platforms for owner criteria and standards driven into BIM and operations. OBO shared this data with their consultants and contractors and deployed a BIM Roadmap to support a facility’s entire lifecycle - including construction. Now in its fourth year, the OBO BIMStorm continues to build on its annual successes.

Collectively these owners operate over 40 Million square meters or ~64 Pentagons’ worth of facilities, a pretty big galaxy of change!

Good NewsUsable Platforms Exist

A few taps on your phone get you a ride from your hotel to a downtown office building. The driver knows exactly where to pick you up, drop you off, and you never have to fumble for cash to pay. The Uber digital twins are in platforms accessible through the web to many apps. This may sound impossibly complex, but it is achievable and is already in our pockets. Today’s smartphones are powerhouses of digital twin data that have changed our world.

With this existing technology, digital twins bring dramatic benefits to the construction industry and building owners. The building industry is late in adopting new technologydriven processes — making an opportunity for those ready to jump in. The good news is that there are simple ways to start connecting to common data environments. The Google Workspace tools are one example. Start by loading data into a Google Sheet table and then access that same Common Data Environment from other sheets. Next, build an app from the same source sheet using Google AppSheet. With a bit of practice, you can run an app in a few minutes. Next, use an API to link to other source data from BIM. A live sample file that you can practice with is linked below: http://Onuma.com/Micro

The building industry is in transition and still uses many file-based exchanges, but there are more advanced solutions enabled by platforms. It will be a hybrid, and we can all use both now. Platforms drive the world, digital twins, and building owners’ current and future needs.

Standards - Less Talk More Use

Uber can find you in real-time because of the Global Positioning System (GPS), created and owned by the US Government and opened to the public in 1983. Without that shared asset and standard, the internet would not be where it is today. The same location-based information is critical for digital twins. Standards from buildingSmart. org, OGC.org, ISO, w3c.org, and many others support digital twins. However, a lot is possible regardless of an available industry standard if you first demand machine-readable, secure, and open data. But standards alone don’t help us to get anywhere without implementation. They don’t connect the islands as long as they are not open, created on paper documents and in experts’ heads. Remember, open does not mean access to all. Once data is machinereadable, it can be classified, stored, and secured. For example, it is not wise to put employees’ home phone numbers in a BIM. Regardless there should be less theoretical talk about standards and more active implementation. You can draw Xs and Os on a chalkboard all day, but eventually, you must hit the field.

How to be a Leader in the Digital Galaxy

The internet and mobile devices exploded in value, driven by location-based and realtime information. Similarly, BIM and digital twins with massive amounts of data in precise locations will be huge. So, as facility owners, architects, engineers, builders, suppliers, and asset managers, you have the chance to become part of this galaxy. By doing nothing, plenty of other industries are moving in. So, join us in the BIMin’ series of BIMStorms, where we share, teach and learn from each other to accelerate adoption and understanding and then apply it to realworld scenarios at the center of the universe! Contractors who understand how to maintain the continuous Use of information from planning through commissioning are best positioned to meet owner needs –maybe even before the owner realizes they need these information-sharing business processes. Understanding what is possible today puts contractors in the best position for winning projects tomorrow. Industry leaders who can provide value to these owners will be leaders in the digital galaxy, generate value, enable change, use the force, live long, and prosper!

Kimon Onuma, FAIA, is an architect who started working with BIM 30 years ago. His company, ONUMA Inc., builds informed environments to guide large facility owners and the building industry and has developed web apps for BIM and the facility lifecycle. He started BIMStorm.com as an online venue in 2008 to foster collaboration with the industry through open data connections. ONUMA Inc. has received multiple industry awards for innovation.

Aha! In 1993 we had an “aha” moment. Every element in BIM has an ID (it was not called BIM then). Sharing that BIM ID makes it possible to associate other data to the exact location, such as in spreadsheets. For example, the person’s name in room 101 does not have to be jammed into an object by a BIM expert! Instead, they can be listed and maintained in a spreadsheet by a non-BIM user. Within a few years, we added external databases, and by 1999 our web-based app connected the BIM IDs to other systems. This approach is foundational to everything we do today with the technology and strategies we provide to large owners. Simple IDs shared in open data are the key to connecting many data sources and digital twins.

There is an enormous number of articles, podcasts, etc., regarding our construction industry’s adoption or lack of adoption of the latest technology/innovation trend of the day. I am in empathy with our construction industry community in our current dilemma. This short piece is meant to provide some horizon lines and comfort that we, holistically, are headed in the proper direction.

Construction Documents as the Digital DNA of the Built Environment

As the fulcrum of how all projects exist and are conducted, construction documents are the foundation elements of how the built environment conducts business. Usually, Construction Documents are how the designer communicates the design intent to the constructor on behalf of the building owner. As an industry, we have moved relatively fast from physical drawings and specifications as the construction documents to the emergence of digital drawings (CAD/BIM) and specifications as the new standard of care. As digital standards of care move from finite files to decentralized streamed legal documents through processes like Smart Contracts, our industry is yet again challenged to keep up with the times. The one element of stability as the workflow processes of designing, building, and delivering a building in today’s