A Framework for a BIM-based Knowledge Management System

Knowledge is generated in projects throughout the design and construction processes in Architecture/Engineering/Construction (AEC) projects. The management of this knowledge has been implemented by various firms in AEC the industry through the development of lessons learned databases, best practices, project closeout interviews, communities of practice and various other informal techniques. In the traditional project processes which don’t use building information modeling, the data generated through the project life cycle is typically stored in a fragmented manner in multiple formats. This makes it difficult to capture, catalog and disseminate the knowledge present in the data effectively. The objective of the research study described in this paper was to identify the ways in which Building Information Models can be used for effective Knowledge Management. Building Information Models are data-rich, object-based, intelligent and parametric digital representations of building structures. In this research, we hypothesize that the parametric models used in building information modeling can provide a centralized global context to the information stored therein and thus be an effective tool as a knowledge store; provide support other knowledge management processes. In this paper, we present a method to capture knowledge during the design and construction processes using the parametric, object oriented nature of the BIM models; extract the stored knowledge from the BIM models; present a framework for classification and dissemination of the knowledge. Finally, we present a framework to enable the use of Building Information Models to support the organization wide Knowledge Management processes.