Applying building information modeling to support fire safety management

• Published in: Automation in construction Vol. 59; pp. 158 - 167
• Main Authors: Wang, Shih-Hsu, Wang, Wei-Chih, Wang, Kun-Chi, Shih, Shih-Yu
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 01.11.2015
• Subjects: Assessments; Building information modeling; Building management systems; Escape route planning; Evacuation assessment; Evacuation routing; Fire protection; Fire safety education; Fire safety equipment maintenance; Maintenance; Management; Modules; Safety; Web-based safety management; Escape route planning; Evacuation assessment; Building information modeling; Fire safety equipment maintenance; Fire safety education; Web-based safety management
• ISSN: 0926-5805; 1872-7891
• DOI: 10.1016/j.autcon.2015.02.001

Building information modeling (BIM) is useful in three-dimensional (3D) visualization and data/information storage for planning and maintaining building projects. Recently, researchers globally have been exploring the applications of BIM. In this work, a BIM-based model is designed to support fire safety management of buildings. The model comprises four modules — evacuation assessment, escape route planning, safety education, and equipment maintenance. The evacuation assessment module integrates BIM with a Fire Dynamics Simulator to calculate the required safety egress time and the available safety egress time to evaluate the ability to evacuate in case of fire. The escape route planning module utilizes BIM to determine whether the distance of an escape route is acceptable. The safety education module presents hazardous areas, videos of escape routes and directional maps, all in three dimensions, to educate the occupants of the building about fire safety. The equipment maintenance module is implemented in a web-based prototype to support maintenance tasks in a remote management manner. The results of applying BIM have demonstrated that BIM can effectively provide 3D geometric data to support the assessment and planning of fire safety (using the first three modules), and it can store information in support of safety management and property management in a web-based environment (using the equipment maintenance module). •This work designs a BIM-based model to support fire safety management of buildings.•The evacuation assessment module integrates BIM with a Fire Dynamics Simulator.•The escape route planning module uses BIM to determine whether the distance of an escape route is acceptable.•The safety education module presents hazardous areas, videos of escape routes and directional maps, all in three dimensions.•The equipment maintenance module can store information in support of safety management and property management in a web-based environment.