Autodesk digging into the Built Environment : Augments ‘Reality Capture’ Stable by acquiring Alice Labs
Posted by Jim Foster in 3D, BIM, Built Environment, New Technologies on October 18, 2011
80/20, the amount of construction projects that happen in the built environment vs. new construction, at least here in Boston and this is usually the case across the globe, maybe not 80/20 but having the majority of construction happening in the built environment. So if you’re Autodesk and you have all this great software, you can no longer presuppose the data, you are going to have to capture it somehow.
Autodesk put another arrow in their ‘built environment’, ‘as built’ or soon to be trademarked “reality capture’ quiver by acquiring Alice Labs. As reported in Graphic Speak, Autodesk Scoops up 3D point cloud innovator Alice Labs. And if you go to the Alice Labs website, all you get is a splash page saying they have been acquired by Autodesk, and no press releases from Autodesk either. Why not? Autodesk is like the borg, well I can’t comment on the assimilation part, but as far as sucking up cultures within their universe, no problem. So why not let people know.
The small team, closely related to ongoing research at technical universities in Delft, Netherlands and Ghent, Belgium, has previously released Studio Clouds, an innovative 3D laser point cloud editing technology that offers plug-ins for Autodesk’s 3ds Max and Maya modelers, and uses a proprietary game engine for fast manipulation of point cloud data…Behind the application is the Mirage Nova Engine (MNE), said to be capable of handling billions of points with ray-trace visualization quality. NME also offers a photogrammetric tool, offering an affordable way to generating high fidelity point cloud models from photographs. MNE is designed for 64-bit multi-core architectures and can take advantage of graphic card acceleration for maximum speed. -Randall – Graphic Speak
Either way, Autodesk is interested in getting you working in their software whether it’s for new construction or the the built environment, designing retrofits or modeling New York for gameplay. If it’s a 3D environment they want to put you in it, and Autodesk wants to be the transporter…Kirk Out <end cheesy Star Trek word play>
The renovation market is now breaking loose…BIM
Posted by Jim Foster in BIM, Built Environment on October 13, 2011
In a recent article in the ENR (Engineering News Record) ENR’s Top 600 Contractors Awaiting a Recovery, the news is mostly bad. Revenue is down 8.7% for the Top 600 from 2009 and they do not expect a recovery anytime soon, for new buildings. One of the bright spots, “the renovation market.”
“Our maintenance and retrofit market is up 40% in the past year,” says Limbach’s CEO Bacon. After three years of bottled-up demand, he says, the renovation market is now breaking loose.
Being Tech Savvy is a plus as well in cutting the waste out of construction and trying to maintain already thin margins. “If you are not fully proficient in [BIM], you are way behind,” says Dean. He says the first phase was to show that BIM actually worked in the construction process. The industry is now in a second phase, in which practical improvements are being implemented on a regular basis. “It’s not just a clash-detection tool anymore,” says Bill Dean, CEO of M.C. Dean.
BIM FM Rundown
Posted by Jim Foster in BIM, Built Environment, New Technologies on October 7, 2011
BIM, supposedly, sits at the center of managing a building from design to demolition. The longest part of that arc, facility management, seems to get the least amount of press and attention. Interestingly enough, Autodesk purchased FM Systems in in 2006 and discontinued its product FM Desktop by 2009. This seems to leave a gaping whole in their portfolio but perhaps they just wanted to build something from the ground up integrated with Revit, maybe its in the pipeline somewhere. In between, there is an excellent article on AECBytes, BIM for Facilities Management, that breaks down the current BIM FM Marketplace.
Current Players:
ArchiFM now VintoCon
Working on the live integration between BIM and BAS (Building Automation Systems)
What I don’t completely understand is the step child status of FM applications. Autodesk shed FM. ArchiCAD seems to be distancing itself from FM with the introduction/spinoff of Vintocon, maybe it just takes too much work and integration, however, according to NIBS, Whole Building Design Group, that over a 30 year life of a building, operating it costs 3x more than building it. One would think programming/implementing software to manage this process would be worth the effort, then again that’s 3x over 30 years. My feeling the more it is integrated with BAS (Building Automation Systems) which then links directly to energy usage, the more popular it will become.
Steve Jobs : Bus Driver
Posted by Jim Foster in Uncategorized on October 6, 2011
I’m going to miss Steve Jobs. Why? I did not know Steve Jobs, never spoke with him but only knew him, like most of us, through his and his people’s creations at Apple, Pixar and I guess to a degree at NeXT. Steve Jobs was a visionary, and that is not a title that can be handed out, it has to be earned and he earned it. I always felt good knowing that he was out there, driving what’s next, driving the bus and the fact is, I don’t know who’s going to be the next driver and that makes me sad and like anyone’s passing I am sad that his family and friends will no longer be able to enjoy his company.
On life, and death. Everything else is secondary. Steve Jobs’ 2005 commencement speech at Stanford:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
“Don’t cry that it’s over. Smile because it happened” – Dr. Seuss.
UK National BIM Survey : Go ahead take it.
Posted by Jim Foster in BIM, UK on September 30, 2011
In the 2011 report (NBS) discovered that almost half of the UK construction industry was not aware of BIM. This was at a time when the government was finalising its new construction strategy that will mandate the use of BIM for government projects of £5million and above. In addition, only 13% of the UK had adopted BIM, showing that it was far from being a world leader in this field.
This is their second survey and the survey will run from Friday 23 September to Friday 28 October.
Complete the NBS National BIM Survey now.
BIM Survey : It’s a Process : Second Place – It’s Revit : 5th Place – Korean Food
Posted by Jim Foster in Adoption, BIM on September 29, 2011
There are more discussion threads on what BIM is then I care to mention or dive into. Usually it turn’s into a bowl of alphabet soup with VDC (Virtual Design and Construction) and IPD (Integrated Project Delivery) etc. and the fact is it means different things to different people. So I put up a poll on the website, and I feel fine about the argument that the people who A) come to my web site and B) respond to the poll are industry professionals with a vested interest in BIM and all it entails, otherwise, really how would you get here? Certainly not by googling, “Jersey Shore” or “Justin Bieber”.
My interest here was not to put a stake in the ground and define BIM. It was to see how the market defines it, and the market defines it as a ‘process’ that they understand that the ‘I’ (Information) is more than lip service but more interestingly, at least to me, is that Revit comes in second, even before “It’s a technology”. What impact does that have? For developers, I think a large one. If you are developing software for a BIM platform, and as much as we want open standards, seamless cross platform migration, etc, the fact is until is there is an open source BIM Engine / BIM authoring tool you have to choose, and if you are a developer it makes more and more sense to choose Revit, at least at first. Now all you Revit haters, let’s hear it ArchiCAD people, I don’t care what you think is superior technology, the world is littered with “superior” technology has beens never was. For my purposes I follow what’s market driven. The history of what technology takes off and why is more interesting, a’la the VHS vs. Betamax war, and why many people thought Sony lost with superior technology.
Why you chose what technology you chose, is entirely up to you and your process. I’m just the messenger.
Flaring Off A Finite Resource : North Dakota Natural Gas best used to heat the outdoors.
Posted by Jim Foster in Green on September 27, 2011
Listen, I am a capitalist and have recently become a big fan of the Carbon War Room which creates market based solutions for creating climate change, that is, let’s create something that reduces our reliance on fossil fuels and makes money all at the same time, in fact, let’s stop relying so much on the extraction of oil from the most politically unstable places on earth, that would be a good thing as well. So reading today’s NY Times “In North Dakota, Flames of Wasted Natural Gas Light the Prairie” I get a little worked up.
Every day, more than 100 million cubic feet of natural gas is flared this way — enough energy to heat half a million homes for a day.
Really, WTF. I’m sure the companies operating would love to capture the gas to sell but as mentioned in the article the infrastructure is not there to capture it, pipelines and processing. So let’ s look at the math
Natural Gas is running at the about $4.00 per 1,000 cubic feet at the wellhead, and they are running 100 million cubic feet a day so 100 Million/1,000 * $4.00 = $400,000. (multiplied by 365) = $146 Million Dollars per year.
WTF. And this is just from the commodity straight from the well head it does not count the economic impact of a new natural gas facility and the margins made by in between, etc. Okay I am sure an infrastructure project to capture all this is not cheap, but talk about a shovel ready project with a revenue stream able to pay off investors. But in a bid to extract as much oil as possible from the Bakken Field in North Dakota through hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling more and more and more gas will be released as a byproduct.
Why flare, because it’s easier and cheaper while extracting the more “valuable” oil from the fields. So while scientist try to figure out how extract energy from wood pulp and the sun, algae and the like myopia continues to claim more victims as we burn a precious, finite resource because it’s convenient. Let’s put even more people to work in North Dakota building the infrastructure in a planned and smart way. Wayne Schafer is quoted at the end of the article saying, “You can do it fast or you can do it right.” or I’ll quote one of the construction managers we’ve done work for, “You can do something no ass, or you can do something full ass, just don’t do it half ass”
“Rocket” science applied to buildings : NASA BIM
Posted by Jim Foster in BIM, New Technologies on September 26, 2011
Excerpted from the NASA Press Release: NASA Partners with DOE to Construct ‘Greenest’ Federal Building
MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. – NASA’s Ames Research Center and the Department of Energy (DOE), at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, Calif. are collaborating on technologies and processes for what may be the “greenest,” highest-performing building in the federal government.
Originally developed for aerospace applications, NASA intelligent system software will be installed in the new building, called Sustainability Base, by Ames engineers. These NASA-developed control and Integrated Systems Health Management (ISHM) technologies will be an integral part of the building. To help integrate these “smart system” technologies, the Building Technologies Department at Berkeley Lab developed a Building Information Model (BIM) to serve as the repository for the building’s systems information during its life cycle. Using data from the BIM, Berkeley Lab developed an energy-performance simulation model to optimize the building’s energy operations.
For more information about Sustainability Base, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/greenspace/sustainability-base.html
For more information about NASA Ames, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ames/
For more information about Integrated Building Solutions, Inc., please visit: http://www.ibs-cal.com/
For more information about LBNL’s Building Science program visit: http://eetd.lbl.gov
Unlocking the Multi-Billion Building Retrofit Market from the Carbon War Room : #BIM
Posted by Jim Foster in Built Environment, retrofit on September 21, 2011
The Carbon War Room harnesses the power of entrepreneurs to implement market-driven solutions to climate change. The world needs entrepreneurial leadership to create a post-carbon economy.
The War Room’s unique approach focuses on bringing together successful entrepreneurs, business leaders, policy experts, researchers, and thought leaders to focus on market-driven solutions. -www.carbonwarroom.com
Anyone who read the times article yesterday and from their own web site saw that these guys are putting a wrapper around Retrofits , from the engineering to the financing that can be sold as bonds with a 7% return mainly paid from the savings incurred from the retrofit projects, has to love this approach. It puts people back to work, it saves energy and dollars, and it provides a return on capital for those invest in it, awesome. One has to imagine that more financial institutions looking to bundle, promote, sell new products is going to love this. From ‘green’ investors down the line. There’s a job recovery program for you.
Green Capital Global Challenge from Carbon War Room on Vimeo.
Financing coming together for Green Building Initiatives : Consortium put together by The Carbon War Room
Posted by Jim Foster in Built Environment, Green on September 20, 2011
So you want to retrofit a building. Everything is in place, the ROI calculations, the press for promoting your green building, possibly higher SF Lease Rates because of the Green Building, plus you’ll be saving money from it, less green house gases, less dependence on fossil fuel, etc. The one thing missing, no matter how much it makes sense, the financing. Excellent article in the NY Times, Tax Plan to Turn Old Buildings ‘Green’ Finds Favor, explaining the current model which would be in the form of bonds sold to investors. “The consortium was put together by the Carbon War Room, a nonprofit environmental group based in Washington set up by Richard Branson, the British entrepreneur”, what doesn’t this guy do.
As excerpted from the Article:
Short-term loans provided by Barclays Capital will be used to pay for the upgrades. Contractors will offer a warranty that the utility savings they have promised will actually materialize, and an insurance underwriter, Energi, of Peabody, Mass., will back up that warranty. Those insurance contracts, in turn, will be backed by Hannover Re, one of the world’s largest reinsurance companies.
As projects are completed, the upgrade loans, typically carrying interest rates of 7 percent, will be bundled into long-term bonds resembling those routinely issued by governmental taxing districts. Barclays will market the bonds. Retirement funds have expressed interest in buying these bonds, which will be repaid by tax surcharges on each property that undergoes a retrofit.
This all is just starting to make too much sense.
