Building Information Modelling for performance-based Fire Safety Engineering analysis – A strategy for data sharing. (October 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Siddiqui, Asim A.; Ewer, John A.; Lawrence, Peter J.; Galea, Edwin R.; Frost, Ian R.
• Is Part Of: Journal of building engineering. Volume 42(2021)
• Publication Date: 2021-10
• Subjects: Building information modelling -- Fire safety engineering -- Evacuation modelling -- Fire modelling -- Industry foundation classes; Building -- Periodicals; 690.05
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jobe.2021.102794
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2352-7102

Abstract

Abstract: The Hackitt Report into the tragic loss of 72 lives in the Grenfell Tower fire, identified failures and poor practices associated with the UK construction industry. To address these failures the report makes several recommendations, including the development of a "golden thread of information" to be embedded throughout the entire building lifecycle enabling the recording and preservation of information. This is to be achieved through Building Information Modelling (BIM). However, to create a "golden thread of information" in BIM from the Fire Safety Engineering (FSE) perspective particularly for the performance-based approach, many significant challenges and limitations must be resolved. These challenges include the fact that no FSE specific information exchange is available in BIM and that the results produced by fire and evacuation modelling tools are not explicitly captured in the BIM Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) Model. Of the FSE tools that support BIM, this is mainly limited to geometry extraction from an IFC file. In this paper, a practical conceptual strategy to pave the way to resolve these problems is proposed. A number of developments by the authors are discussed, forming part of an international collaboration project proposal administered by buildingSMART to enhance the IFC Model from the FSE perspective. Additionally, to evaluate and demonstrate the benefits of two-way data flow between BIM and FSE tools, a prototype system together with a preliminary FSE based analysis database have been developed. The work presented in this paper, provides a practical road map for creating a 'golden thread of information' in BIM for performance-based FSE analysis. Highlights: Identification of current limitations of BIM for FSE. Identifies the need for a strategy to integrate FSE into BIM. Provides a practical road map for integrating FSE within BIM. Proposes changes to the IFC Model for improved support for FSE. Demonstrates two-way data sharing between BIM and FSE using a prototype system.