ISO 19650 is the international standard for managing information over the whole life of a building or infrastructure asset using BIM. In short: the client sets out what information it needs, each delivery team plans how it will deliver it, and everyone shares it the same way through a common data environment. Here it is in five minutes.
ISO 19650 Explained In Five Minutes
The video below is from a talk explaining ISO 19650 for the US BIM market.
We explain why ISO 19650 is important for teams in the USA, what ISO 19650 is and share some resources to get started.
Thanks go out to the group of around 200 people at this online BIM (Building Information Modeling) conference by USC!
Why should the USA care about ISO 19650?
There are many excellent BIM standards and guidelines in the US and worldwide. However, the newest, most widely used and most developed is the "ISO 19650 series" (watch more video intros here).
With ISO 19650 adopted in multiple countries (at government level) and backed by key BIM leadership groups, ISO 19650 is becoming the global BIM standard.
Some key points about the ISO 19650 standard:
- ISO 19650 outlines the concepts and principles for information management (BIM)
- ISO 19650 can be applied to all asset types (projects)
- And ISO 19650 is a truly unified approach for BIM management
ISO 19650 standards are being adopted by multiple countries
BIM professionals see ISO 19650 as the "Global BIM Standard"
To reinforce the importance of ISO 19650 in the USA, the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) joined forces with the Centre for Digital Built Britain (CDBB).
The two groups signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to help design and construction teams implement better information management practices. The US effort set out to adapt the UK programme and materials (with the excellent work from the UK BIM Alliance) as a guide to a U.S. national roadmap aligned with ISO 19650. CDBB's funded programme has since ended, and NIBS carries the US work on through its U.S. National BIM Program.
ISO 19650 Explained in five minutes
Ok, so ISO 19650 is important - let's take a closer look. In the five-minute video below we explain ISO 19650, why teams should care about it, and some resources to get started.
Access PDF of Slides (opens in a new tab)
ISO 19650 in four short lists
- The parts: 1 concepts and principles (2018), 2 the delivery phase - design and construction (2018), 3 the operational phase (2020), 4 information exchange (2022), 5 security (2020) and 6 health and safety (2025). Revisions of Parts 1 to 3 are in draft; the current editions stay in force until they're published.
- The roles: the appointing party (the client), the lead appointed party (often the lead designer or main contractor) and the appointed parties (the task teams) - free lesson on the roles.
- The documents: the client's OIR, PIR, AIR and EIR, answered by the delivery team's BEP, responsibility matrix, TIDPs and MIDP - a template for each.
- The steps: eight in Part 2, from assessment and need to project close-out - all eight on one page in the free ISO 19650 PDF.
Conclusion
The ISO 19650 series is the most comprehensive set of BIM and information management standards in the world today.
When we gave this talk, the partnership between NIBS and CDBB was expected to lead to a US National Annex (US NA) for the ISO 19650 series.
A National Annex is an appendix any country can add to set out its own requirements for using the standards locally - for the USA, adapting them to local BIM practice. Two topics we expected plenty of views on: 1) the ongoing debate about LOD and Level of Information Need and 2) file naming standards.
Learn more about ISO 19650 and get your team involved in how it's applied where you work.
HERE ARE TWO ISO 19650 RESOURCES:
Which ISO 19650 template will you use first?
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