Building Information Modeling Digital Technology: the detail practice of BIM technology used in Environmental design teaching in High Educational Institution

. Building Information Modelling(BIM) is the foundation of digital transformation in architecture, engineering, and construction(AEC)industry. BIM is the holistic process of creating and managing information for a built asset. A traditional CAD and 3D modelling technology is widely used in university’s architecture and landscape courses teaching today. Every single detail of traditional course education does not match the internationally market and BIM technology which is more common and popular today. Using BIM technology in university to teach architecture and landscape design will make changes to design education, and will improve the education practice in Environmental Design system. This article will introduce more detail about BIM technology, and how it changes and affects traditional architecture & landscape teaching, how this technology merged with professions, and how this technology brings comprehensive learning ways and new insight for students in their future career life


Introduction：The concept and Long term potential of BIM
As the function of Building Information Modelling, BIM system builds 3D digital architecture model for city planning and building construction.Based on the architecture digital database，BIM system manages and synchronizes information including companies, design units, contractors on one platform in digital model [1].Today, BIM technology and GIS (Geographic Information System) widely support architecture and landscape design system, since digital technology in architecture and engineering field can transform concept to 3D visual reality, perform visual walkthrough in constructed building model, automatically complete construction document, at the same time, minimum the period of project time.
Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a set of interacting policies, processes and technologies generating a "methodology to manage the essential building design and project data in digital format throughout the building's life-cycle" [2].Building Information Modelling (BIM) offers a novel approach to design, construction, and facility management in which a digital representation of the building product and process is used to facilitate the exchange and interoperability of information in digital format.BIM is beginning to change the way buildings look, the way they function, and the ways in which they are designed and built [3].BIM technology is widely applied among the international architecture and engineering field today, mainly through Revit, ArchiCAD as the software platform.

The background of development
With the development of information technologies for industrial plants, more and more tools for digital design, creation and operation of industrial facilities are emerged.In particular, significant success in development of Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Digital Twin technologies (DT) should be noted, which act as tools for digital transformation and representation for construction and production technologies respectively [4].In the United States, 3D-4D-BIM Plan was promulgated by the government in 2003, at the same time, a series of regulations were specified.Since 2006-2007, government projects have required the use of BIM systems to achieve the goal of improving efficiency and reducing costs, and since then BIM has gradually become popular in non-government projects, and BIM has been widely adopted by architectural design or integrated firms; Scandinavian countries such as Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland were also early adopters of BIM system, and over the years have also been working to promote interoperability and standardization of the system in various fields; In 2016, the UK clearly required that certain related industries must use BIM, and all engineering projects must use 3D BIM; In South Korea, the government plans to implement BIM applications for all public works by 2016; In Hong Kong, from 2014 to 2015, the government plans to adopt BIM applications as a design standard for all housing projects; In Singapore, the government set up a BIM fund; It is planned that by 2015, more than eighty percent of construction enterprises will widely use BIM [5].In China, whether to the clients of government or magnates in industry, the expectations of BIM are not as optimistic as the above-mentioned countries, but the trend of market has become clear.that by 2020, prefabricated buildings will take place of more than 20% of new buildings, and by 2025, prefabricated buildings will take place of more than 50% of new buildings.The core technology of prefabricated buildings and prefabricated decoration is "integration", and BIM digital technology is the main line of "integration" [6].

The development status and practical significance of BIM in higher education institutions
There are many benefits of building information modelling (BIM) to the construction industry when compared to the traditional approach to design and construction.To properly prepare students, many schools are introducing BIM in their coursework as a response to the current and future needs of the construction industry.The aim of this research was to evaluate the current implementation of BIM and to identify trends in the teaching of BIM in architecture and construction academic programs [7].
Many courses in architecture, civil engineering and related majors have introduced BIM teaching strategy in most universities in China.These courses usually include basic BIM concepts and principles, skills in using BIM software, creation and editing of BIM models, management and sharing of BIM data.Through these courses, students learn the fundamentals of BIM and apply the skills through projects.Some universities have also set up BIM laboratories or research centers to provide students with more practical opportunities and research supports.These laboratories are usually equipped with BIM software and related equipment, and students can join events such as BIM modelling workshop, collaboration and communication in the laboratory.
The environmental design in universities and colleges in China has also gradually introduced relevant content in the teaching and application of BIM.The environmental design profession is generally concerned with the planning, design and arrangement of spaces within buildings to provide a comfortable, functional and aesthetical environment.From the architectural design to the construction and maintenance, the BIM model can be used to coordinate and optimize the design process.In the teaching of environmental design, some schools have begun to incorporate BIM teaching into the curriculum.Students can learn how to use BIM software to create models of interior spaces and learn how to integrate interior design elements (such as furniture, lighting, materials) with the model of the building.Additionally, they can learn how to use BIM models for interior space analysis, lighting simulations, energy efficiency assessments.In terms of practical application, students in environmental design can participate in BIM modelling and collaborative work of real projects.They can collaborate with architects, structural engineers, and other related disciplines to create a unified BIM model that ensures interior design is coordinated with other aspects of the building.According to the survey results of students in environmental design in colleges and universities, BIM technology has greater advantages in site analysis, rapid budget, information parameterization, and drawing efficiency.
Despite the many potential advantages of BIM technology in the teaching of environmental design, there are also some challenges.First, students need to learn and master the operation and functions of BIM software.This may require additional training and study time.In order to solve this problem, educational institutions can provide corresponding training courses to help students gain the basic knowledge and skills of BIM technology.Secondly, the application of BIM technology requires the support of computer platform, which may require certain investment.Educational institutions may consider providing necessary computer equipment and software licenses to ensure that students can use BIM technology for learning and practice.In addition, instructors also need to adapt to the application of BIM technology in the teaching process in order to effectively guide students.Instructors can participate in training and workshops to enhance their professional capabilities.
Popularization of the application of BIM technology in environmental design is relatively slower than that in architecture and civil engineering courses in high education institution.There may be some objective reasons:

Professional characteristics
Environmental design focus on the planning and design of indoor spaces.Architecture and engineering concentrate on building details and artistry.BIM technology is mainly used for architectural design and construction management.For interior space design, the traditional 2D drawing may be more intuitive and flexible.Therefore, today, traditional design strategy such as hand-drawing and hand-made models are still popular in many institutions.

Resources and the quality of instructors
The application of BIM technology requires the support of corresponding software tools and hardware equipment, as well as a team of instructors with relevant skills.Compared with architecture and civil engineering, environmental design may have relatively fewer resources in this area, resulting in a relatively slow progress in the promotion and popularization of BIM teaching.

The requirement of Industry
The construction and civil engineering industries began to apply BIM technology earlier, and in these fields, the application of BIM has become the industry standard.In contrast, the needs for BIM in the environmental design industry may be relatively low.
Nevertheless, with the popularization of BIM technology in the construction industry and the expansion of its application scope, experts in environmental design have gradually realized the importance of BIM began to incorporate it into teaching content.With the passage of time, as the industry's demand for BIM technology increases, the teaching and application of BIM in environmental design may be gradually improved.In order to understand the teaching and application popularization of BIM technology for environmental design majors in Chinese universities, this study invited some domestic universities to collect research information for college students, including Zhejiang Gongshang University, Zhejiang Gongshang University Hangzhou College of Commerce, Shanghai Visual Art Design College.According to the survey, most students in environmental design in colleges and universities have learned that the application of BIM technology in the construction industry is becoming more and more common.Students realized that learning BIM technology is very important to their future employment opportunities (Shown in figure 1).

The development status and practical significance of BIM in higher education institutions
With the rapid development of science and technology, the application of digital technology in architecture and engineering field is getting extensive.As a popular tool today, BIM technology has played an important role in various construction relative industry.However, in the professional teaching system of environmental design in most higher educational institution, the application of BIM technology is lost.With extensively applied on many prefabricated building projects, BIM technology has become an asset for the environmental design profession.Through BIM simulation, the original model can be directly modified, which greatly saves the time and cost of design and construction.The designer can modify the interior finish and furnishing directly in BIM model by family modular, and scheme comparison, construction budget and space environment analysis.BIM digital technology for environmental design has the following advantages: visualization, parameterization, synchronization, and industrialization.

Visualization
BIM technology provides a new visualization insight, allowing environmental designers to use the traditional two-dimensional design method to directly convert line information into three-dimensional information, and build a complete 3D model while completing the plane layout, and can casually pick the angle of view for rendering.This process can simply and effectively express the designer's ideas and intentions, and provides customers with a comprehensive visual experience.Through BIM technology, students can simulate and visualize the design process of environmental design works.Students can use BIM software to create a virtual environment model to design and arrange, so they can better understand and demonstrate design ideas.Students can also use BIM technology to create a virtual reality or augmented reality display, so the audience can experience the effect of work immersively.

Parameterization
The most impressive feature of BIM technology in parametric design is that when BIM is applied to both interior finish and furnishing, every detail of internal structure and materials are recorded.By building 3D model, the construction document is also completed.The three-dimensional model can enhance students' interest, and at the same time enable students to better understand the materials, crafts and structures of buildings, and provide students with a virtually but real social practice opportunity.

Synchronization
The collaboration on BIM platform is mainly reflected in the synchronization of professional design and construction management.BIM technology can also enhance the collaborative ability of students.Synchronization is one of the core features of BIM.Students can conduct teamwork by synchronize work on the platform.Once a digital model is completed, professional designers of different fields can optimize in time by checking through calculation.Environmental design students can also collaborate with architectural, landscape and interior designers, and coordinate with structural, mechanical and electric engineers.

Industrialization
Industrialization of construction can be realized by using BIM technology.Industrialization of construction is an identification for combination of prefabrication in factory and building on-site construction.Building components can be processed in factories and transported to the construction site.This production can greatly reduce costs, improve construction quality, save project time, and reduce resource waste.Prefabricated design has been applied to environmental design field to consider the size of furniture, equipment, building components using standard modules to design the space is beneficial to building components and production, while in the past professional teaching, more consideration was given to the expression of artistic effects, but practicability was ignored.

Teaching strategy of BIM in environmental design
Because the low popularization of BIM technology in environmental design in colleges and universities today, it is suggested that BIM teaching content should be included in the core courses, including interior design, landscape engineering, architectural renovation, computer software training and other related courses.The course introduces the basic concepts, principles of BIM, and demonstrates how to use BIM software for building space modeling and analysis.Colleges and universities should regularly organize BIM software training or workshops to make students familiar with commonly used BIM software, such as Revit, ArchiCAD, and provide basic and advanced training courses to help students master BIM modeling skills and workflow.Students in environmental design are encouraged to cooperate with students in architecture, civil engineering and other related majors.Through interdisciplinary cooperation projects, students can understand and experience the synergy and application value of BIM technology in different professional fields.
The BIM environmental design course should be combined with real cases, following the teaching strategy from architecture to interior, from modeling to application, from subject to detail, from simplicity to complexity, and from generality to specialty, emphasizing pertinence and practicality.The teaching strategy is suitable for high-skilled talents in higher education institutions.Case tasks are assigned at each learning stage, and the subsequent knowledge points are explained during the case tasks.Finally, the key points are consolidated through project training to ensure the combination of work and learning, appropriate use, and detailed teaching appropriately.The teaching content should intuitively be presented the convenience and fun of using BIM technology, and enable every student to improve the knowledge and ability to use BIM software, so that the teaching quality will be improved.
Generally, computers that can run CAD and 3Dmax can meet the hardware requirements of BIM software.A school-enterprise cooperation model can be adopted.Students and instructors in school can work synchronically with professional designers in design firms on one platform.BIM training workshop, lectures, and other professional resources can be advocated to support the BIM professional training.
Zhejiang Gongshang University Hangzhou College of Commerce currently has laboratories such as the "BIM Digital Laboratory" and the "Materials and Structures Laboratory"; There are three laboratory facilities available, with a total laboratory area of 390 square meters; And it has a dedicated 100 square meter laboratory.There is a computer training room in the center, with advanced equipment and complete functions, providing a guarantee for the smooth implementation of BIM practical teaching.In the professional courses, courses such as "Fundamentals of BIM Technology Application" and "BIM Modular Design" have been set up, and the application of BIM digital technology has been integrated into various professional courses such as "Building Renewal" and "Residential Interior Design", carrying out teaching such as site environment analysis, project management, and data analysis.
Establish a BIM group, mainly based on Insight 360, supplemented by other energy plug-ins, focusing on three aspects of energy, lighting, and solar energy, to achieve energy consumption data visualization, heating and cooling data visualization, sunlight transformation visualization, skylight, and glare visualization, solar visualization.
Establish crowd flow analysis and behavior simulation.Based on human behavior, analyze the highest density, average density, space utilization rate, travel time, number of people gathered in the area, walking routes and interweaving conditions to make an analysis chart, and compare the relationship between human activities and carbon dioxide emissions in the space.
Analysis of fire protection system, node design and curtain wall.Build the construction, structure, electromechanical and other infrastructure using family libraries in BIM, and perform energy calculation to analyze the impact of such systems on carbon emissions during the construction process and after construction completed.

Comparison with traditional teaching
The combination of BIM technology and teaching can enable teachers and students of all majors to share model database, integrate engineering drawing, budget estimate, construction and other relevant professional knowledge, improve the integrity and system of learning, not only make the teaching content more vivid, but also allow students to better understand the knowledge and improve the learning effect [9].
Traditional teaching strategy is to use CAD drawing and SU modelling to support students to understand design, which is different with using BIM.Through the statistics and the actual feedback of the students, the results and experiences obtained during the teaching experiments are as follows.
Faster: The BIM system combines 3D and cloud technology, which greatly saves the time compared with using other traditional software.Students acquire professional ability and professional knowledge faster.Through completed presentation, BIM teaching has a fuller image than the vision of traditional teaching.
Observation: The relationship between a single building and the site around the building, and the contour line of the site.
Energy Analysis: The BIM software can present building energy data for material and structure analysis.
Teaching and practice are carried out simultaneously: Traditional teaching is mainly based on the explanation of theoretical knowledge, which is separated from practical experiences.Combined with the application of BIM related software, every step in practice can be reproduced in combination with theory.Traditional architectural teaching pays attention to the calculation of architectural space volume, and usually starts with the floor plan to deliberate the functional area, which has limitations, ignoring the relationship between a series of horizontal and vertical sections in the process of space generation.BIM modeling enables the simultaneous generation of building horizontal, vertical and section integration, and the corresponding relationship with the other two can be observed when building the model.It supports to better understand the modeling steps.
Connected with international standards: The application of BIM system has been very popular internationally.By learning BIM system, students can increase their understanding of international projects and expand their insight for profession.Some elective courses abroad offer Revit software learning.Revit is widely used in large-scale commercial projects abroad.Due to the development of cloud technology, architectural designers, structural engineers, and MEP engineers can manage and edit the same BIM model on one platform.

Comparison with traditional software
From the observations in the surveying and mapping class, students who use Revit to complete the construction drawings are faster than those who use hand-drawing and CAD drawings, which can save 2-3 days of time.
Taking residential design as an example, the process of drawing construction drawings in CAD is relatively primitive.It takes 2-3 hours to draw a complete plan; directly create walls and space drawing through Revit Plane can be shortened to 1-2 hours.
Using CAD to complete construction drawing, it is necessary to draw the section and elevation according to the size of the plan, and it takes 3-4 hours to draw the completed section and elevation; and Revit has already generated a complete model directly in the software through the first drawing plan, no need to draw additional sections and elevations, saving an additional 3-4 hours.To draw sections and elevations through CAD, you need to measure and draw one by one from the plan.In Revit, you can use the section tool and elevation tool to directly cut out the desired elevation and section at any time.It can be deleted with one key, which is convenient and quick, and there is no need to measure step by step.In CAD, usually typeset to [Layout], adjust the scale and typeset.Revit can directly set the image ratio in the window, and then directly pull the image to [Drawing].This step does not seem to take much time, but we can see a list of all components and details of this project from the Revit project browser window, which is more systematic than the CAD layer, and it is more convenient to find every detail of the drawing.

Conclusion
The application of BIM technology in the field of construction is applied widely in international market today.As an important place for learning and study, higher education institutions should also apply research and teaching by using new technologies [10].BIM technology has great potential in the teaching of environmental design.By combining the teaching content of BIM technology and environmental design, a richer and more practical learning experience can be provided, and students' creativity, skills and teamwork ability can be cultivated.However, the application of BIM technology also faces some challenges, which require that instructors to solve.With the continuous advancement of technology and the promotion of education reform, the application of BIM technology in the teaching of environmental design will become more popular and important.In the new generation, highskilled educators and professionals in higher education institutions, we should change our insight, keep up with the construction industry, gradually develop professional training in BIM environmental design, and constantly strive to improve professional quality, to cultivate assets for the country and the society.

Fig. 1 .
Fig. 1.Data survey for Whether BIM knowledge improves efficiency

Fig. 3 .
Fig. 3. Statistics on students' preferences for Revit and other software In 2011, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development listed BIM and collaborative technology as key promotion technologies for China's construction industry in 2011-2015 China Construction Industry Informatization Development Outline.In September 2013, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development issued Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Application of BIM Digital Technology in the Construction Field, which clearly pointed out that "In 2016, BIM digital technology will be used in the design and construction of all government-invested project buildings which is more than 20,000 square meters".In 2015, the government officially released Several Opinions on Promoting the Development and Reform of the Construction Industry, officially incorporating BIM and engineering cost data applications into the important development projects.The 2016, Several Opinions on Further Strengthening the Management of Urban Planning and Construction was proposed by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council,