Abstract
Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a convenient tool that is capable of collecting information throughout the whole life cycle of a building in one platform. The evolution in the digital BIM model in early design stages is not standardized, but Level of Development (LOD) is a concept that systematically structures the design processes divided into five levels. LOD is assessed in this paper as an opportunity to enhance the calculation of the environmental impacts in different early design stages more efficiently, using the methodology Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Enlightening the building elements that contribute to highest release of CO2, permits early building material selection. This facilitates a pathway towards sustainable and environmentally friendly buildings. This study evaluates BIM based LCA in early design stages (low LOD) through literature reviews and a case study. This papers’ case study executes LCAs at different LOD levels using the LCA software One Click LCA (OCL). Assessments in LOD 200, LOD 300, LOD 350 and an additional LOD 350 were utilized. The additional LOD 350 was deployed when LCA experts had implemented changes within OCL. Moreover, a concretized suggestion where today’s unpredictable development of BIM becomes part of a LOD framework is proposed.
Highlights
There are several basic, well-established scientific links that constitute the background for this report
Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) databases like Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs)-Norway can be used to evaluate the impact assessment, but whereas there is no information related to materials or products, average or most likely values, can be adapted into the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)
There are three main approaches to Building Information Modelling (BIM)-LCA integration, and all approaches are seeking on reduce costs, lower the greenhouse gases (GHGs) emissions and increase the efficiency during early design stages of buildings: 1. Conduct LCAs using several programs: BIM is not able to act as the sole software to conduct LCAs
Summary
There are several basic, well-established scientific links that constitute the background for this report. The proposal of this report is to investigate which features that are required in an interaction between BIM and LCA in the early design stage (low LOD), to evaluate the environmental performance of a building. This study focuses on the LOD in the design stage using BIM, and how a BIM-based LCA can help improve the environmental impacts, limited to buildings. The embodied energy is the energy required to produce the building materials, and it is related to the production stage (A1-A3) of the life cycle stages. The building industry is an important factor regarding the densification of GHGs in the atmosphere, 39% of total energy and process-related emissions (UN 2018a; IEA 2018). Since the emergence of low energy buildings, the literature shows the importance of embodied energy and emissions during building constructions and production of materials (Häfliger et al 2017)
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