The future of the sustainable green architecture through technology

ABSTRACT

Green and sustainable buildings have gained a lot of importance in recent years due to growing environmental concerns where developed and developing countries have their own evaluation systems and methods of qualifying green or sustainable construction.

According to Egypt Vision 2030: Sustainable Development Strategy, Egypt’s population is expected to increase significantly. Therefore, this will require an increase in the percentage of areas planned and built, resulting in more construction sites and land areas being used to cover this alarmingly rapid demographic increase.

There is an urgent need to provide guidelines and strategies for the development of the construction sector as a catalyst for the green building, therefore effective decisions on the sustainable design of the building facility can be made only during the early design and pre-construction stages. Traditional planning and construction does not support the possibility of such early decisions. There is a lack of integration in design procedures leading to an ineffective process of previously changing the design to achieve a sustainable building-friendly environment

So BIM represents a shift in the traditional process of delivering buildings, where the Green Building Information Model (BIM) is a data provider application to assess energy performance and sustainability. As Green BIM’s extensive and practical application remains largely unrealized. Failure to understand the application of sustainability measures to the BIM design process is a major obstacle.

So that there is a need to create a consensus between BIM and green buildings, this paper provides BIM applications in design support, from green buildings and future research trends in this area.

KEYWORDS:

• Green architecture
• BIM
• sustainable architecture

Introduction

Buildings consume a good amount of energy and also are a major contributor of Global Carbon dioxide emissions. Due to the rising energy prices and environmental concerns there is a demand for construction of sustainable building facilities with minimal environmental impact through the adoption of environmentally friendly architectural design and construction techniques [1].

Sustainable buildings aim to reduce negative impacts on both the natural environment and built environments within building scales themselves, and regional and global environments [2]. Sustainable building development can be achieved through sustainable design and construction [3]. Sustainable design is generally evaluated by sustainable building assessment systems that provide valuable references and guidelines on how to develop sustainable buildings.

Sustainable design can minimize energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions [3],therefore, sustainable construction is vital as it can provide practical solutions to environmental impacts and resource consumption encompassing the entire building life cycle [4].

Various approaches to Building Information Modeling (BIM) have been adopted by professionals and researchers to implement sustainable design [3,5]. The application of BIM tools and technology to achieve project sustainability or green design goals is an emerging area of study. In order to provide a framework for understanding the various approaches to Green BIM and the opportunities and barriers, quality sustainable design requires an understanding of how a building will perform after its construction, which in turn requires computer-based simulation software to accurately analyze the building. The advent of Building Information Modeling provides greater opportunities for building analysis by pairing analysis software and BIM for seamless assessment of building performance [6].As the implementation of BIM for improving sustainability is an important trend in design and construction [7].

BIM has come a long way since the early 3D models, using only one comprehensive BIM model as contractual information about building design. The use of BIM benefits can become an important asset in providing a more sustainable design. Linking impact parameters to model objects will reduce uncertainties and can provide the entire project with highly accurate qualitative and quantitative parameters of environmental performance. The detailed information about the chassis behavior can be used to improve usage during its service life, where the construction industry has been pushed to adopt green building strategies in light of growing sustainability concerns like reducing carbon dioxide emissions

Building Information Modeling (BIM) is considered by many to be an important opportunity in architecture. BIM emerged as a solution to facilitate the integration and management of information throughout the building life cycle [8] (Figure 1), thus providing an opportunity to make the best use of the design data available for sustainable design and performance analysis [9].

Figure 1. Benefits of BIM.

Sustainability analysis into traditional design, construction, and operation processes

Current technologies still face various technical challenges to effectively support and efficiently process large amounts of data to facilitate sustainability-related decision-making. Nevertheless, that BIM provides better tools and processes to enhance overall sustainability when analyzed from a holistic life cycle perspective, as BIM could significantly facilitate green construction and it is expected to be extensively used in the future if relevant challenges could be identified and effectively tackled.

Green BIM is the sustainability evaluation of buildings to provide data for assessment of energy performance. It consists of Building Energy Modeling which includes estimating project energy performance to determine various design alternatives to enhance the building energy efficiency during its period of operation.

Sustainable Green building

There is no universally accepted definition of sustainable design, the most commonly referred-to definition is from the Brundtland Commission which stated that ‘Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meets their own needs’. One of the biggest threats to the sustainability of the planet’s resources to support human civilization is global climate change [10], sustainability with respect to building industry can be described as how much greener the building is in terms of energy, materials, site planning, water, as such, designers and owners in the industry are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of their sector in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and they must take more steps to realize the industry’s emissions saving potential.

Accounting for the entire lifespan of a building is critical when evaluating the impact of design choices. For instance, more than three quarters of a building’s energy consumption may be during the operational phase [11], and energy saving in the construction stage may conflict with energy savings during operations, exemplified by more concrete increasing thermal mass and reducing heating and cooling requirements

A fundamental tenet of sustainable design is the integration of all the building systems among themselves as well as with the economic, social and environmental context of the project [3], as there is potentially a lot to save by adopting smart design solutions. With energy and solar calculations, one can use the concrete’s energy-reducing abilities not only to calculate but also to optimize a building’s energy usage (Figure 2).

Figure 2. Stages of design to implementation [12].

In order to achieve more comprehensive sustainable solutions, an expansion of traditional thinking is required while making decisions during the design process, including [3] minimizing the consumption of resources, understanding climate, culture and place, the function of the building, the needs of the community, using locally available resources and natural systems (Figure 3)

Figure 3. The relation between green and sustainable building [13].

Building information modeling (BIM)

BIM is an object-oriented approach where structural drawings have been augmented or replaced with a virtual, 3-dimensional digital model of a building, or even complex sites with multiple structures. In recent years, integrated and mature BIM, however, extends beyond simple 3D-models, as BIM becomes a powerful tool for clearly conveying the designer’s intention to the team on site (Figure 4). And may contain properties like spatial relationships, structural analysis, geographic coordinates, sun conditions, material properties, quantities and other technical properties like thermal conductivity, and so on. BIM may even be used as a tool for keeping track on construction schedules and maintenance planning [14].

Figure 4. Design team, integrated Method = BIMCan achieved by BIM system in all phases [15] (Author).

There by reducing waste on site and the carbon footprint of the project. Additionally, APIs like this can be reprogrammed to also include properties to indicate sustainability. BIM tools like Autodesk Revit also allow designers to undertake energy performance analyses, which not only help to make energy-conscious decisions early in the design process, as Revit Architecture can be used for designing very complex process of sustainable design like orientation and solar study, and automates the activities such as Green Building Studio to further provide specialized functions. BIM provides data which is required to assess building sustainability and is therefore a powerful method to improve sustainability [4].

The Relation between BIM and sustainable green architecture

There are two entities associated with green BIM, namely BIM and green buildings. In terms of BIM, the key features of BIM are captured by the ‘BIM attributes’ dimension in the taxonomy, which represents the analytical functions that BIM software can provide to the built environment. The essential features of BIM can be summarized into four aspects, namely integrating with various databases, facilitating document management, visualizing analytical processes and results, and providing sustainability analyses and simulations. In terms of green buildings, two important dimensions, namely the ‘project phases’ and ‘green attributes’ are adopted to describe green buildings. The ‘project phases’ dimension captures the perspective of project lifecycle. Any green project experiences a lifecycle process that starts with project design, through construction, operation, maintenance, and ends with the demolish phase.

•Green BIM (the relation between green architecture and BIM):

-Since BIM captures both design and engineering data, materials and building components can be specified precisely according to plan and alternatives evaluated accordingly, eliminating misinterpretation and incorrect changes.

-With the power to create relation and order among design, engineering, scope, and budget data, BIM transforms information into a meaningful, functional representation of all building elements. According to experts, much could be accomplished in the next 10 years, due in part to BIM tools enabling more green building (Figure 5)

Figure 5. The relation between BIM and sustainable green architecture [16].

Green BIM for Sustainable

Sustainable design can be carried out using Building Information Modeling by developing a framework which establishes the relationship between BIM based sustainability analyses and certification process like LEED, as BIM analysis tools provides many design alternatives to identify the sensitive parameters that affect the energy usage. By bringing variations in the parameter values, we can opt for the best option to create an energy efficient structure, where building Information Modeling for energy or sustainability analysis also has its own disadvantages. The results of energy simulation are greatly affected by the accuracy of energy model, inputs given, size and complexity of the project (Figure 6)

Figure 6. Steps for carrying out green BIM.

Energy Efficiency is a crucial parameter to decide whether a material is environment friendly or not. A certain amount of energy is vital to maintain the comfort and convenience of the users of a building. The major energy losses occurring in a building are the transmission and ventilation heat losses. Also, there are energy gains happening which are from appliances, users as well as solar energy gains through openings.

Energy Analysis requires the knowledge of the following data:

Dimensions, plan, areas and volumes of different spaces of the building, Arrangement of rooms in thermally similar zones, Building orientation, Thermal features of all construction units, Operational usage of the building, Appliances loads, Lighting and occupants loads, Heating, ventilating, Power/Water rates and Climatic information, the ‘green attributes’ dimension includes sustainability considerations that could be addressed by using BIM software, such as energy, thermal comfort, carbon emissions, water, material waste, day lighting, natural ventilation, and acoustics analysis, where BIM and green buildings have interactions. The interactions could be decomposed into two aspects, namely how BIM could support the different phases and the whole lifecycle of green buildings (i.e. BIM attributes- project phases); and how BIM could support the various sustainability aspects of green buildings (i.e. BIM attributes-green attributes).

Building information modeling is an effective tool for integrating natural systems and technical characteristics into architectural design. Impact of sustainable design methods in green buildings can be analyzed using building information modeling including all aspects of energy efficiency, lighting and material sustainability, as well energy analysis in buildings including airflow analysis and ecosystems of buildings from sunlight can be performed through BIM.

Energy Efficiency can be evaluated by using BIM in design process, where using BIM helps in making recommendations for design alternatives that will enhance a buildings performance, as Green buildings improve living by improving indoor conditions such as lighting and environment of building (Table 1)

Table 1. Energy efficiency can be evaluated by using BIM in design process [17].

	Green building	Regular building
Construction Cost	+5% to 30% = 105,000–130,000$	100,000$
Energy cost	Go down 30–40%	100%
After 15 years	10% overall cost saving	0%cost saving
After 40 years	20%overall cost saving	Energy cost > construction costs

Sustainability of buildings has become a critical consideration for building design as decisions made in the early design stages has a significant influence on the actual environmental impacts of buildings [18,19]. Traditional design methods are limited in terms of continually analyzing sustainability during the design process due to fragmented information [20], as a BIM model can be used as a database for data

BIM allows interdisciplinary information to be superimposed on a single model, creating an opportunity for sustainability measures that will be incorporated throughout the design process [21]. With the aid of these BIM applications, architects and engineers can share sustainability-related information more effectively,

Like daylight and energy consumption, thus sustainability analysis can be seamlessly integrated into the design process. BIM can also help designers leverage existing building data sets to improve the virtual configuration of building simulations during the early stages of a new building design [22] .

Other BIM software provides broad and comprehensive sustainability analyzes, such as Green Building Studio (GBS). GBS is mainly used in the design stage, but it also serves many end users, including architects, designers, and engineers, as well GBS can be run for various scenarios to give an idea of how sensitive the parameters that affect energy usage are. The parameters like orientation, roof construction, wall construction, window glass, skylight glass, infiltration, equipment and lighting have enormous impact on energy performance of a building.

BIM software can assist green buildings in namely energy consumption, carbon emissions, natural ventilation, solar and lighting analysis, acoustics, and water usage

Revit MEP Links to IES: Revit product (Revit MEP) gained the ability to calculate heating and cooling loads directly using an IES engine.

As well Ecotect is used extensively in academic settings and is popular in many firms for early design studies. Architects rave over its intuitive graphic interface

BIM in integration with software’s like green building studio, can simulate and optimize energy efficiency of every part of building from energy use to interior climate.

BIM helps in making sustainable early design, with the help of Green BIM stakeholders can make early decisions in the design

Day lighting Analysis

• The daylight simulation calculates the daylighting quantity and quality within the spaces of the building. • provides ‘LEED v4 EQc7 opt2’ results • generate illuminance renderings that include electric lighting (Table2).

Table 2. Day lighting analysis [17,23].

Analysis Type	Description
Illuminance Analysis	Full custom control over date, time, threshold, and analysis plane height
LEED v4 EQc7 opt1	Automated settings for LEED v4 EQc7 opt1 (sDA & ASE) settings
Solar Access	Customizable hours of sun study

Solar Analysis

-Insight Solar Analysis provides in context solar radiation analysis results to help you track solar energy throughout your design.

-Could be used for PV energy production assessment (Table3).

Table 3. Solar analysis [17,24].

Analysis Type	Description
Solar Energy –Annual PV	Annual simulation for determining PV energy production estimates
Custom	Customizable simulation for general solar insolation studies

The role of BIM to sustainable green building

The BIM applications are designed and developed for various sustainability analyses, such as energy performance, CO2 emissions and lighting analyses. A few BIM applications have also proposed solutions for water conservation and indoor air improvement. However, most of these applications are designed specifically for one type of analysis and cannot address others. As a result, industry practitioners may underutilize their capabilities in using these BIM applications

[25]. In the future, a generic and integrated green BIM application is needed that would allow a systematic analysis of a building’s whole environmental sustainability.

The dependence of BIM software on external database could generate potential risks for sustainability analysis. If the external database has incomplete data, BIM software then has to use unmatched data to input the default parameters, which leads to deviations in its calculations.

New research initiatives can also improve BIM by providing new analytics or more reliable solutions through various methods, such as using social media, big data, and human behaviors to engage stakeholders and increase simulation accuracy. Similar studies are expected to be conducted to enhance the sustainability of research in the built environment(Figure 7)

Figure 7. Analysis the Building Information Modeling (BIM).

Figure 8. Grand Egyptian Museum layout [31].

BIM in the Egyptian Market:

Over the past few years, the Egyptian (AEC) industry tried to adapt the new BIM technology and some Egyptian Consultants, contractors and PMs have started to use BIM in some of their projects such as Benchmark BIM projects the Grand Egyptian Museum, sky Medical Center, Credit Agricola Bank (New Cairo Headquarter) the city of Al-Alamain(Table 4)

Table 4. Examples of applying BIM on projects.

Grand Egyptian Museum
Company: Besix – Orascom Architect: Henegan peng Year of the project:2012 Area:471,000 m2(Figure 8).
BIM Work Strategy Use of BIM in project design 1-Start the BIM model from the tender drawings and send all the RFI to the consultant to solve the design problems(Figure 9). 2-Detect the clashes between architecture, structure and MEP models. -Define CDE and team responsibilities. -Update the:OD of BIM model and coordination drawings. -Make workshop drawings with all details to serve the construction site. -Use Digital fabrication & maintenance strategy [26] Criteria for assessing BIM in project design: 1. Beginning of site and project data collection. 2. Phases of implementing BIM in the project 3. The guiding program followed
BIM Software(Figure 10). Revit Architecture Revit structure Revit MEP Tekla STAAD Navisworks Inventor [27]
Sustainable treatments The use of local building materials, which is reflected in the emphasis on using stones and bricks or alabaster as a cladding material, the selection of the beige and yellow sand color of the desert added to the harmony between the proposed building and its site, and promote the preservation of the ecological balance in that sensitive location (Figure 11). [27]
Environmental Control The reduction of the thermal load inside the building is of particular concern, as well as the control of natural lighting and the prevention of direct sun rays from reaching the displayed objects. To ensure a process of assessment of the possible impact due to the implementation of the museum structure, - The Control of solar radiation; The Control of Natural Cooling, Reduction of Internal Gains; Passive Climatic Control(Figure 12).
The Control of Solar Radiation One of the most efficient ways of avoiding solar irradiation of the external walls of a building can be provided by the use of permanent or mobile screens or light protection structures or by well designed vegetation. These mobile shading devices may help to resolve problems of overheating(Figure 13). The museum structure is placed almost completely underground and is signaled by the three structures that emerge from the desert and form a system of panoramic reference points.
Internal Heat Gain Natural lighting through double height spaces is used as a basic concept for the project. Natural ventilating systems such as wind catchers provided by double height spaces together with sun-shading devices are used with updated technology. (Figure 14). [27]
Natural Cooling: A system has been planned utilizing de-central air conditioning units placed in the mounting of the gems to avoid long supply distances.The fresh outside air is conditioned and supplied through ducts in the double wall to each level.The thermal mass of the building structure is utilized for radiant and connective cooling. It is planned to integrate water-cooling tubes into the concrete structure of the ceilings. (Figure 15).
Using BIM in project design: -Stages of (planning – design – implementation – operation) -Points used: Determine how to manage the information and set policies the work. -Points not used: Determine the required information for the area -Responsible for management. -Final rate of project evaluation in BIM: 64% -Difficulty in collaboration with traditional CAD technical office -BIM software needed more updated computer hardware. -shop drawing revision was so hard because of complex geometries. -interoperability issues between subcontractors. -BIM standards are not available yet
New Alamein city-Egypt
Company: ARAB CONTRACTORS Location: Al Alamein, Egypt Year of the project: 2016 (Figure 16)
BIM Software (Figure 17) Revit Architecture Revit structure Revit MEP Tekla STAAD Navisworks Inventor
BIM Work Strategy - Documentation of all project documents using 360BIM -Coordination all graphics of the same specialty and model work using the REVIEW -Integration of all models from all disciplines and multi-disciplinary project work using REVIEW -Detection of cross-disciplinary engagement using Navisworks -Create a default timeline and show mode using Navisworks -Make costing by Primavera and Navisworks(Figure 18, 19) -Coordination of all projects using Infra works 360 (Figure 20) Infra Works 360 Coordination between projects in a virtual environment. Draw networks (drainage – water and irrigation networks) with the upside down level in drawings and check errors Draw roads and determine the quantities of excavation and fill
-Coordination between projects in a virtual environment. -Draw grids (drainage- water and irrigation systems) at the inverted level of graphics and check errors. -Drawing roads and determining the quantities of drilling and filling
Results of using BIM technology in the city of Al-Alamain (Figure 21). -Promote collaboration among project stakeholders -Enhance coordination and integration of graphics -Reduce time and costs -Facilitate the explanation of the project implementation statement

The future of the sustainable green architecture through technology

The prerequisite technology for sophisticated sustainable design by clever use of BIM-tools exists, there is yet much unrealized potential. Linking the design and construction phase to the operations phase through BIM may enable much more efficient asset management, while high software complexity could be an issue if users do not have sufficient knowledge about BIM (Figure 22). It was discovered that due to users’ irregular and inaccurate update of BIM models, credits in LEED certification are difficult to be documented by green BIM software [29].

Object-based design with BIM enables much more efficient access to this information and will enable new, more sustainable workflows. One example is combining the BIM model with Augmented Reality (AR).

Several challenges exist for popularizing these tools. The current BIM software is still insufficient in providing an integrated analytical solution for an individual GBA, as it does not have the capacity to simultaneously analyze all green aspects of buildings. Most types of BIM innovation credits in LEED require that the proposed project design present exceptional performance above LEED requirements, or show innovative performance that has not been previously addressed by LEED. A LEED panel committee evaluates the innovativeness of the proposed design, which is difficult to be automated using BIM software.

There are no applicable case studies to evaluate its performance and effectiveness. Future research can simplify the operations of BIM instruments and thus facilitate the transition from traditional GBA to BIM-based GBA.

That current green BIM practices are heavily technology-driven instead of process-driven. Future research could further examine the industrial business processes and goals of BIM application in LEED projects.

Conclusion

Using BIM applications to facilitate green built environment has received growing attention in both academia and the industry.

BIM may help mitigate a common problem among new designers in projects seeking green building ratings, although it may not be the best way to achieve sustainability for a particular building [30], as BIM could facilitate data exchange and integration, provide visualized building performance analyses, and enhance the communication and collaboration of various stakeholders during the lifecycle of green buildings.

BIM allows the designer to view the building through a detailed digital model that contains the characteristics and information needed to make informed decisions about the sustainability of design options, giving the designer great advantages to reach the goal of permanent and sustainable design in all design disciplines.

BIM software capable of calculating real-time performance parameters within the building, and how the integration of the BIM and sustainable design solutions will facilitate easier adoption of sustainable project delivery processes, as the data required for supporting green design is obtained during the design process and the same is also taken from building information model as and when needed.

Future research of BIM software could focus on the development of new functions which provide flexible and qualitative-based evaluation for these currently unsupported credits, as well as the integration of different types of existing BIM-based green analytical tools, thereby providing an integrated BIM-based platform

This study presents a review of the nexus between BIM and green buildings and the many different benefits for the green BIM application, however, there are some arguments for using the BIM for green building. Even though BIM could add values to green building development however it isn’t the main factor for it, there are many challenges facing using BIM for developing sustainable Green building; which is lack of supports for the construction and operation phases of green buildings; lack of industry standards holistically covering the various application areas of green BIM low accuracy of BIM-based prediction models, but it can help in project organizing and visualizing while the building process. While BIM is a way to improve the quality instead of sustainability, but it must be supported by relevant institutions (academic, technical, and economic), supported by the government according to a specific sequence, and not quick and sudden.

Figure 9. Grand Egyptian Museum layout [31].

Figure 10. BIM stage in Grand Egyptian Museum layout [32].

Figure 11. Use BIM in project design [27].

Figure 12. The use of alabaster as a cladding material scheme [33].

Figure 13. Environmental analysis for Grand Egyptian Museum [33].

Figure 14. Use of artificial lighting in the exhibition spaces and constrains the reach of natural light to the interior [33].

Figure 15. Example of an integrated passive system [28].

Figure 16. Surfaces of the gems is utilized to create a high thermal comfort for visitors by reflecting the thermal IR radiation of the cooled ceiling and cold-water surfaces [28].

Figure 17. The military hotel/AlAmein [34].

Figure 18. Navisworks (4D simulation-The military hotel/Alamein)[34].

Figure 19. BIM 360 Doc [34].

Figure 20. BIM 360 Doc (3D Arch.walk Through view-The miltary Hotel/AlAmein) [34].

Figure 21. BIM Community evaluate the project[33]

Figure 22. The Role of BIM to Sustainable Green Building.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).