Entrant details
Role or Job Title on the Project
Research student
Employer
Department of Architecture, University of Naples, Federico II
Employer Role
Academic or Research Institution
Are you or your employer a member of buildingSMART?
No
Submission details
Submitting Party Company Name
Department of Architecture, University of Naples, Federico II
Submitting Party Company Location
Naples, Italy
Submitting Party Role on Project
Research Student
Submitting Party Company Website
Full Project Name
Environmental Suistainability and Energy Management of a Retrofit Project, The ex Corradini Factory
Project Location (Country)
Italy
Project Objectives
The Master’s Degree Thesis in Architecture (Tutor: prof. arch. Sergio Russo Ermolli; co-tutor: arch. Giuliano Galluccio) has intended to reflect on how to introduce the principles of environmental and energy sustainability from the early stages of the design process, through a strategic approach based on the use of advanced operational tools and digitalized information, facilitating collaboration between involved disciplines and promoting the diffusion of technologically advanced projects.
The objective was to provide an environmentally sustainable project for the rehabilitation of the archaeological-industrial heritage, optimizing the available resources and using tools that conduct analyses of compliance from the preliminary design stages.
openBIM Achievements
By taking advantage of the BIM ability to manage information directly from the model, it was possible to minimize the risk of problems, excluded or postponed in the traditional design, solving them in the early stages of the decision-making process, making it more informed and allowing to manage in a more conscious way complex information regarding materials and the entire building.
Parametric objects were implemented with environmental data through interoperability with the BIM-based LCA software Tally and, thanks to an IFC-based approach, project validation analyses were conducted on technical and legal regulations.
openBIM used
IFC 2x3, BCF
openBIM or open standards used other than those listed above
Software used
Revit, Solibri Model Checker, Tally, usBIMviewer+, usBIMplatform, Termolog Epix X, Insight 360, Green Building Studio
Strategic Alignment
The unique and shared model allowed to analyse different aspects of the project simultaneously and to make the necessary improvements immediately. Thanks to the interoperability with software for calculating environmental impacts, it was easily possible to view the best performing solution from time to time, evaluating the design alternatives with the relative impacts, to achieve a better quality of the project and construction: improvements were obtained in terms of energy efficiency, reduction of the carbon footprint and efficient use of materials.
Highlights
• Minimization of the environmental impact and the risk of design errors in the preliminary design stages
• Increased efficiency and quality of design
• Selection of the most sustainable option among different design alternatives
• Implementation of real-time assessments
Llimitation of the manual data transfer between research actors
• Constant verification of regulatory compliance.
Project and Stakeholder Logos (compiled into one .ppt/pptx file for upload)
Project Address
Via Boccaperti, via Vigliena, vico Marina 54
San Giovanni a Teduccio
Naples
Italy
Project Type
Mixed-Use
Size of Project
Detailed description of the project
The project develops the use of methodologies and procedures for the assessment of environmental and energy sustainability, through integrated design platforms to find data related to environmental impacts. The study had as object of analysis the preliminary project of the Municipality of Naples, an intervention for the recovery and architectural redevelopment of the ex Corradini factory complex, evidence of industrial archeology of the early nineteenth century and located in the San Giovanni a Teduccio district of Naples. The industrial area is the subject of the “PROSIT project- Project in Sustainability: qualification and digitalization in construction”, expression of the synergy between the STRESS consortium and the Municipality of Naples.
The research addressed four topics:
- Sustainability assessment: developing a methodology and analyzing tools for assessing environmental and energy sustainability, which guarantee the synergistic participation of all the actors involved in the construction process.
- Use of innovative materials: acquiring specific skills that can be used for the analysis and characterization of materials and systems with high sustainability characteristics, assessed through the use of the Life Cycle Assessment methodology.
- Design and management: integrating the BIM approach to the theme of sustainable development in the construction sector, to facilitate the decision making process.
- Retrofit intervention: integrating the process of industrialization and sustainable regeneration within the building processes and the needs of innovation and digitalization required by the building industry.
The integrated design with BIM method had an impact on the entire design process, making it mandatory to address some problems, which in a traditional project would have risked being left out or postponed to too late a stage in the design process, in a completely new perspective, in particular as regards aspects related to environmental sustainability.
To develop a collaborative process and a better interoperability of the information among the authors of the research, the activity has been based on an OpenBIM approach. The OpenBIM standards, tools and software platforms have been analyzed and used for the exchange and above all the integration of information regarding the environmental impact potentials related to building materials and components, selected in the architectural project.
The parametric modeling started from the reconstruction of the architectural artifact in its actual state into a "coordination model", where the individual buildings were connected to form a single "federated" model. Subsequently, the project status was modeled as indicated by the Municipality of Naples, creating the parametric families and reconstructing the elements in their original appearance.
Having selected one of the buildings as demonstrator on which to apply the operational strategy, the intervention concerned the optimization of the performance of the building envelope, to improve energy efficiency and obtain the reduction of consumption and waste of energy during operation. In compliance with the historical nature of the building, reversible dry interventions were selected and, thanks to Revit's plug-in software Tally, it was possible to conduct LCA comparative analyzes of the materials and technological solutions, selected for the project: so various design alternatives were analyzed both for the stratigraphy of the new roof and for the thermal insulation of the perimeter walls, from which the solutions with the lowest environmental impact were chosen.
The Life Cycle Assessment methodology tells the quantitative history of each material, from its extraction to the end of its useful life, also assuming posthumous scenarios and it was a fundamental tool for the assessment of the environmental impact and for the conscious choice of the most technological and performing solution, among energy equivalent options.
For the implementation of environmental data in parametric objects, in order to create objects aware not only of their physicality but also of their environmental impact, the ability of the usBIM.viewer + software of the ACCA house to create new IFCProperties categories has been exploited, according to the OpenBIM standards, readable by all components of the project by simply clicking on the building object.
For the study of energy sustainability, other tools integrated with Revit were used to evaluate the energy performance and consumption of the project:
- Green Building Studio is a Cloud-based tool that allowed to perform project performance simulations to optimize energy efficiency;
- Insight 360 made it possible, in an easy and intuitive way, to understand the real energy behavior of the building, proposing possible improvements in terms of energy performance.
These tools have made it possible to obtain useful results from an energy point of view, guiding decision-making in the early stages of the design process.
Taking advantage of the interoperability between calculation software, the intervention was analyzed under different regulatory profiles:
- Solibri Model Checker highlighted the regulatory inadequacy of the original project of the Municipality of Naples, allowing to reduce the risk of design errors;
- Termolog Epix X has verified the intervention in terms of energy (DM 26/06/2015 - Application of the methodologies for calculating energy performance and definition of the minimum requirements of buildings) and environmental (DM 11/10/2017 - "CAM "Minimum environmental criteria for the awarding of design and works services for the new construction, renovation and maintenance of public buildings), by conducting energy simulations and allowing further improvements to be made in the making.
The OpenBIM approach significantly facilitated the process of collaboration and sharing of files and data in the project team, making the work of a complex architectural project faster, safer and more fluid.
Detailed description of openBIM on the project
The openBIM process was fundamental for inserting, extracting, updating and modifying model information with different software.
The energy-environmental requalification project of the former Corradini complex focused in particular on verifying the effectiveness of the regulations, on compliance with the Minimum Environmental Criteria (D.M. 11/10/2017_CAM), on reducing energy consumption and estimating the environmental impact of building objects through the LCA methodology.
The BIM modeling of the complex was carried out using the Authoring Revit 2018 software, which allowed to share information externally, through the IFC2x3 Coordination View 2.0 format files.
We then proceeded to a preliminary analysis of regulatory compliance, exporting the IFC file to the Solibri Model Checker (SMC) code checking software, checking and managing any inconsistencies with project requirements or technical / legislative regulations. Through the BCF collaboration format it was possible to add and exchange notes on the problems highlighted by SMC, for reporting and resolving interference in the model, locating problems within the project through .png images.
Once the inconsistencies highlighted were resolved, particular attention was paid to the creation of the construction packages, whose thermo-physical properties were specified, and to the composition of the stratigraphies for the technological solutions. For the assessment of the built-in environmental impacts, it was used the Tally Environmental Impact Tool, an Autodesk Revit plug-in, which made it possible to provide the BIM model with information on building materials and architectural products.
After successfully generating the energy model in Revit, it was subjected to Autodesk Insight 360 and Green Building Studio plug-ins for energy simulation. These software (integrated with Revit) can also be used with other Authoring software through the gbXML format and Green Building Studio can also export the geometry of the model to gbXML to conduct more detailed analyzes using more sophisticated energy calculation software.
The updated information model was then exported by Revit though IFC2x3 Coordination View 2.0 on the usBIM.viewer+ platform, a software certified for IFC import of the Acca software. The software gave the possibility to implement the building objects with the environmental properties obtained from the LCA analysis with Tally: the integration of the customized IFCProperties, added to the predefined properties by the authoring software used, took place by reading the Excel file set according to OpenBIM standards.
This was necessary to implement the system of predetermined information, adding the properties related to the environmental impacts of materials in their life cycle.
After the definition of the architectural intervention was completed, the BIM model was imported into Termolog Epix X of the Logical software, using the IFC file, which made it possible to verify compliance with legal requirements, the thermo-hygrometric behavior of the structure envelope, interstitial condensation and superficial. The imported BIM model was controllable and editable directly in Termolog: in fact, although most of the information had already been transferred though the IFC file, it became necessary to add new ones, such as thermal bridges.
The methodology outlined made it possible to achieve good levels of sustainability already in the preliminary phases of the project activity, minimizing the environmental and energy impact of the building intervention.
The whole work made use of usBIM.Platform, a collaborative platform certified according to the IFC standard, which allowed easy management and sharing of data and models among the subjects involved in the research, as well as the possibility of investigating the digital model at any time enriched with new information.
Software ecosystem map
openBIM Supporting Evidence
Benefits from using openBIM
The interoperability between the BIM model and the verification tools made it possible to extract the information necessary for energy-environmental assessments directly from the model, created during the early stages of the design. This approach has made it possible to verify the sustainability of the design choices made a work in progress and to turn towards the most advantageous, being able to predict their behavior at different instants of the life cycle of the work.
"We were able to innovate using openBIM."
It's been foundamental from the outset making data open and available throughout the preliminary stages of the project. The use of IFC as an open standard approach made it possible to perform analysis in different design areas and to compare information, choosing the best result. This helped data fidelity and collaboration among the reserch team, ensuring better planning, design and clash detection. Furthermore, a critical approach to the automation of the process was conducted, identifying and convincingly limiting the problems encountered in the implementation of the various methodologies addressed and technical problems relating to the software. The research highlighted some errors that unknowingly can be committed during the design activity, outlining a know-how for future implementations.
"We were able to identify where we need openBIM to develop further."
The outlined methodology, limited to a building as a demonstrator and to the preliminary phases of the retrofit project, can be extended to the whole area of the former Corradini complex and involve other disciplines of the project activity. In fact, this research work, made possible thanks to an OpenBIM approach that facilitated the interoperability process and the exchange of information, can be considered a starting point for subsequent development, opening up to other areas of design and allowing to operate with a more complex approach and wider OpenBIM approach. This would lead to greater benefits and further analysis along the entire life cycle of the project, with the aim of creating high-performance buildings, that can achieve the current energy and environmental targets.
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Stakeholders
Department of Architecture, University of Naples, Federico II, Naples, Italy, Research student, Doc. Fiorella Zullo
Department of Architecture, University of Naples, Federico II, Naples, Italy, Co-tutor, Ph.D Arch. Giuliano Galluccio
Department of Architecture, University of Naples, Federico II, Naples, Italy, Tutor, Prof. Arch. Sergio Russo Ermolli
