Immersive Technology’s Role in Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC)
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The use of AR and VR are on the rise in industrial enterprise applications. In architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) specifically, there are a few use cases that will bring the most value to stakeholders in the entire asset lifecycle.
A white paper by Unity identifies the following trends for immersive tech in AEC:
Mixed reality will extend the usability of existing AEC digital assets and make high-quality modeling a more cost-effective option.
Digital twins will continue gaining momentum in the AEC world as there is a movement towards standardization.
Real-time 3D building information modeling (BIM) and virtual design and construction (VDC) will allow interactive digital environments to become more accessible, more engaging, and add increased value for stakeholders.
The AEC industry is rapidly adopting AR, VR, and other digital transformation technologies. Digitalization can have a positive impact on the entire lifecycle of a project, from planning through operations and maintenance. In addition to a general transition to digitalization, the increase in immersive technology deployment is being driven by:
The need to communicate remotely, accelerated by Covid-19
Reduction in on-site staff
Safety
Real-time communication between office and field teams
A couple of obvious applications come to mind for VR in AEC: remote expert video sharing and guided task-based workflows. Unlike in other industries, these use cases are slightly less valuable in isolation in AEC because most on-site workers are experienced experts.
While they could be very valuable for training and knowledge management, there’s a bigger end game. The real value comes from the remote experts with task-based workflows coming together for downstream uses in the form of digital twins, where equipment is monitored and maintained for operational efficiency via three-dimensional virtual command centers.
If during the entire AEC process, information was collected, integrated, and delivered as a digital twin model at the handover phase, the baseline digital twin would have immutable historical information tied to it. Stakeholders would have the opportunity to leverage information and ROI by integrating valuable data captured at the source through the entire lifecycle.
Although AEC activities can already be digitalized, the issue remains that the information is typically still siloed from the virtual asset, leaving future stakeholders without valuable historical information. By tying in remote expert and guided workflow data into the asset’s twin, the asset history can be visualized at the project level to provide much greater insights into time and cost.
Digital twins can help AEC go beyond just considering data handover requirements and grow to building connected data integration points between construction and long-term data robustness.
AEC companies that implement digital twins can offer their downstream stakeholders a complete asset history and all the information required for a proactive operations and maintenance plan.
Digital twins can help AEC projects get a solid foundation—literally and figuratively.
