Papers by Mads Holten Rasmussen
Technical University of Denmark, Department of Civil Engineering, 2019
The thesis is divided into six chapters where the papers constitute the sixth. The first chapter ... more The thesis is divided into six chapters where the papers constitute the sixth. The first chapter introduces the practical point of departure by identifying characteristics and issues with current practices in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry. In the next chapter, the theoretical point of departure starts by defining a research problem to uncover. In Chapter 3, a set of Research Questions (RQs) are defined based on the findings from the first two chapters. The methodology for investigating these questions is defined, and a set of Research Tasks (RTs) is laid out. Chapter 4 elaborates on the research tasks conducted as part of the present research and refers to the specific papers that describe the findings in detail. Finally, Chapter 5 discusses the implications and draws overall conclusions. Together, the chapters, in combination with the papers, represent the thesis. The overall structure is as follows: Chapter 1-Practical point of departure This chapter describes the practical point of departure. It covers the motivational problem that initially led to taking the initiative to do research in the field and write the thesis at hand. Chapter 2-Theoretical point of departure This chapter describes the theoretical point of departure. Initially, the overall research problem is formulated based on the observed problems from Chapter 1. Through a review of the state of the art literature on the topic, an overview of present research challenges is established, and thereby, this chapter sets the framing for how the research should be focused. xxviii Structure of the Thesis Chapter 3-Research design This chapter describes the research design. Based on the challenges identified in the previous two chapters, a set of research questions describing the research quality criteria are defined. The chapter further defines the overall research methodology and defines three research tasks to be accomplished through the research project. Chapter 4-Results This chapter evaluates on the findings related to each of the three research tasks described in the research design. The evaluation represents a summary of what is described in detail in the associated papers. Chapter 5-Implications and conclusion This chapter discusses and summarises the research findings. The significance of the research is clarified by revisiting the research questions and evaluate the general contributions made to the research community and the industry. Chapter 6-The papers This chapter includes all the papers presented in the List of Papers. The papers are ordered based on publication date and those that were still under review at the time of submission are ordered based on submission date. Practical Point of Departure McKinsey (2017) presents seven ways to improve the productivity of construction being: 1. Reshape regulation and raise transparency 2. Rewire the contractual framework 3. Rethink design and engineering processes 4. Improve procurement and supply-chain management 5. Improve on-site execution 6. Infuse digital technology, new materials, and advanced automation 7. Reskill the workforce Roughly half of these seven items directly deal with information handling. 1. encourages that transparency is enhanced and part of this includes mandating the use of technologies such as Building Information Modelling (BIM). 3. deals with processes and encourages early collaboration from all parties involved in design as well as repeatability of design across projects. 6. deals with investments in innovation offices and teams, the application of BIM and Three-Dimensional (3D) models, and the use of digital collaboration and mobility tools on portable devices. 1.3 HVAC Design as a System This section uses a concrete construction project, a large-scale office building, to elaborate on the "systems of systems"-methodology described in Section 1.1. Here, the systems are denoted 'tasks', and the example demonstrates the overall task of 'designing a heating system for a building' along with the embedded subtasks. This particular design task is revisited in Chapter 4, where a software artefact for radiator sizing is described. Designing a heating system includes several sub-tasks, of which the majority have interfaces with other sub-tasks within the overall design task or to other tasks performed within the super-task of designing the building as a whole. An interface, in this case, entails that the task either consumes information from or generates information to one or more other tasks.
Building Information Modeling (BIM) has brought great benefits to the construction industry by ga... more Building Information Modeling (BIM) has brought great benefits to the construction industry by gathering all information in a project and making it available to the involved stakeholders. However, BIM has predominantly generated value in the design phase of a project, while the potential benefits in the construction phase have been disregarded for many years and are now gaining importance. Trending advancements try to utilize existing BIM data, e.g by linking a digital building model with planning efforts of the construction project and create new knowledge to improve construction. In this paper, we are interested in exploring how semantic models and Linked Building Data (LBD) can support value creation in the construction phase. The presented use case tries to answer the question how the planning of Temporary Construction Items (TCIs) can be improved by semantically describing and classifying TCIs in an ontology that allows to utilize TCI information with BIM data. TCIs only experi...
Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose... more Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
Automation in Construction, 2022
The interoperability of information from design to operations is an acknowledged challenge in the... more The interoperability of information from design to operations is an acknowledged challenge in the fields of architecture, engineering and construction (AEC). As a potential solution to the interoperability issues, there has been increasing interest in how linked data and semantic web technologies can be used to establish an extendable data model. Semantic web ontologies have been developed for the AEC domain, but an ontology for describing the energy and mass flow between systems and components is missing. This study proposes the Flow Systems Ontology (FSO) for describing the composition of flow systems, and their mass and energy flows. Two example models are expressed using FSO vocabulary. SPARQL Protocol and RDF Query Language (SPARQL) queries are performed to further demonstrate and validate the ontology. The main contribution consists of developing FSO as an ontology complementary to the existing ontologies. Finally, the paper introduces a roadmap for future developments building on FSO.
eWork and eBusiness in Architecture, Engineering and Construction, Sep 3, 2018
Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose... more Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose... more Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
Semantic Web, 2020
Actors in the Architecture, Engineering, Construction, Owner and Operation (AECOO) industry tradi... more Actors in the Architecture, Engineering, Construction, Owner and Operation (AECOO) industry traditionally exchange building models as files. The Building Information Modelling (BIM) methodology advocates the seamless exchange of all information between related stakeholders using digital technologies. The ultimate evolution of the methodology, BIM Maturity Level 3, envisions interoperable, distributed, web-based, interdisciplinary information exchange among stakeholders across the life-cycle of buildings. The World Wide Web Consortium Linked Building Data Community Group (W3C LBD-CG) hypothesises that the Linked Data models and best practices can be leveraged to achieve this vision in modern web-based applications. In this paper, we introduce the Building Topology Ontology (BOT) as a core vocabulary to this approach. It provides a high-level description of the topology of buildings including storeys and spaces, the building elements they contain, and their web-friendly 3D models. We ...
The W3C Linked Building Data on the Web community group discusses different potential patterns to... more The W3C Linked Building Data on the Web community group discusses different potential patterns to associate values to properties of building elements. In this paper, we are interested in enabling a different value association method for these and other properties, to account for changes in time, or to annotate a value association with metadata such as provenance, reliability and origin data. Existing ontologies in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry are reviewed first and we motivate the use of the Smart Energy-Aware Systems (SEAS) ontology as a starting point. Next, we list new competency questions to represent the aforementioned metadata and develop an extension of SEAS named the Ontology for Property Management (OPM). We illustrate the use of OPM with different scenarios where a value association needs to be annotated or updated in a dataset using SPARQL update queries.
Building Information Modeling (BIM) is in the industry often confused with 3D-modeling regardless... more Building Information Modeling (BIM) is in the industry often confused with 3D-modeling regardless that the potential of modeling information goes way beyond performing clash detections on geometrical objects occupying the same physical space. Lately, several research projects have tried to change that by extending BIM with information using linked data technologies. However, when showing information alone the strong communication benefits of 3D are neglected, and a practical way of connecting the two worlds is currently missing. In this paper, we present a prototype of a visual query interface running in a web browser, that enables the user to gain a deeper understanding of what can be extracted from a Building Topology Ontology (BOT) knowledge base. The implementation enables the user to query the graph, and provides visual 3D-feedback along with simple table results. The main purpose of the paper is to establish a baseline for discussion of the general design choices that have been considered, and the developed application further serves as a proof of concept for combining BIM model data with a knowledge graph and potentially other sources of Linked Open Data, in a simple web interface.
A novel workflow to combine BIM and linked data for existing buildings
Combining conventional Building Information Modeling (BIM) tools and Linked Data technologies imp... more Combining conventional Building Information Modeling (BIM) tools and Linked Data technologies improves the options to connect building models to external datasets. Existing workflows in this regard expect a conventional BIM model - including object’s geometry - as a starting point. This paper presents a novel, alternative workflow oriented towards existing buildings, including an initial implementation. Modeling the building topology using the BOT ontology is done first, allowing a Linked Data modeler to enrich this initial graph from the start of a project without being dependent on a BIM with (detailed) geometry. Later, a conventional BIM - including objects’ geometry - of the existing building can be made, starting from the shared building topology. At the end of this more flexible workflow, both the initial RDF graph and the BIM-based RDF graph are directly connected to each other, combining both datasets.
The vision of a decentralized, distributed AEC information infrastructure using LBD technologies
Uploads
Papers by Mads Holten Rasmussen