BIM-Based LCA and the role of Regional Variables

With the architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry representing a significant share of global energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, developing sustainable design and reducing buildings environmental impacts has become a priority over the past decades. Adopting building information modelling (BIM) tools and implementing them into life cycle analysis (LCA) techniques at early stages of design has proven to be one of the most effective methods for a buildings sustainability evaluation. It’s quite often that some of these attributes are overlooked due to their insignificance or in order to facilitate the analysis. With our environment constantly going through changes it is reasonable that the construction industry should also aim to adapt to these changes and make use of them. However, the role of local climate features and its effects on a buildings energy output is often so neglected. This research aims to consider the role of climatic attributes and local weather characteristics of a building by using BIM-LCA integration techniques, and see how it affects that buildings energy performance. It is witnessed that by using the proper equipment and construction materials, that matches the respective climate, up to 28% of the buildings energy consumption during the operational phase, can be saved. Admitting changes to the model however, can cause up to 3% increase in the models GHG emissions. Moreover, this work develops a prototype to validate the results.