NIBS to Release National BIM Standard

WASHINGTON — The National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) announced it is kicking off development of a new guideline to help building owners and their design teams utilize building information modeling (BIM) during the building design, construction, and operations process and better support owners’ performance requirements.

The National BIM Guideline for Owners, to be developed under the auspices of NIBS, ASHRAE, American Institute of Architects (AIA), Building Owners and Managers Association International (BOMA), and International Facility Management Association (IFMA), will provide uniformity in the delivery of BIM projects to federal, state, and local government building owners, as well as institutional and commercial building owners.

The guideline is intended for adoption by the building owner to provide a documented process and procedure for the owner’s design team to follow in order to produce a standard set of BIM documents during the design and construction of the facility, and for maintenance and operations of the facility upon handoff. The new guideline will be based on the foreign, federal, state, and local BIM guides that currently exist, but geared to a generic facility with uniform requirements for use by a variety of government, institutional, and commercial building owners. It will reference a range of documents and practices, including those contained within the National BIM Standard-United States® developed by one of NIBS’ own councils, the buildingSMART alliance®.

The development committee consists of about a dozen BIM experts representing important stakeholder groups, including building owners, architects, engineers, constructors, and facility managers. The first task of the committee is to review the relevant and applicable BIM guides currently available, and then proceed to developing the guideline itself. An advisory committee composed of federal, state, and local government representatives who developed existing BIM guides will review the effort and provide input on an ongoing basis. Once the guideline is complete, the development committee will submit the draft guideline to the buildingSMART alliance membership for review and input. The final guideline will then be submitted to the appropriate standards developing organization (SDO) to go through its consensus process for joint publication as an industry standard.

The goal is for federal, state, and local governments and other institutional and commercial building owners to adopt the National BIM Guideline for Owners as the standard procedure for their design/BIM teams to follow, helping building owners unlock the value of utilizing BIM across the life cycle of a building. Establishing criteria, specifications, and expectations in the design and construction process will help owners capture the full value of investing in BIM, while providing a uniform approach for institutional and commercial building owners to achieve consistent BIM requirements for their facilities.

About the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS)
The National Institute of Building Sciences is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that successfully brings together representatives of government, the professions, industry, labor and consumer interests, and regulatory agencies to focus on the identification and resolution of problems and potential problems that hamper the construction of safe, affordable structures for housing, commerce and industry throughout the United States. Authorized by the U.S. Congress, the Institute provides an authoritative source and a unique opportunity for free and candid discussion among private and public sectors within the built environment. The Institute’s mission to serve the public interest is accomplished by supporting advances in building sciences and technologies for the purpose of improving the performance of our nation’s buildings while reducing waste and conserving energy and resources. For more information, please visit: http://www.nibs.org/

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Xcel Mechanical Systems designs, builds and services commercial and industrial HVAC, Plumbing and Process Piping systems for clients across the Greater Los Angeles Metropolitan Area. Our cost-effective solutions make buildings more comfortable, energy efficient, and easier to manage. Our resume includes large-scale implementations across the Aerospace, Commercial, Data Center, Education, Entertainment, Government, and Healthcare sectors. For more information, please visit: www.xcelmech.com