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BIM Landscape: Europe

By September 13, 2019September 7th, 2022No Comments

Digital Transformation

With its citizens living in an ever-evolving digital era, the European Union (EU) have made it their priority to create a Digital Single Economy. On the basis of a set of common digital transformation processes, the EU aim to ensure that its member’s economies can meet the many digital opportunities coming in the future.
As one of the key sectors within the European Single Market*, the construction sector contributes to nearly 9 % of the EU’s GDP and 18 million jobs (European Commission 2018). The digital transformation in this sector is recognised as a key driver of sustainable development of the EU 2020 Strategy. In this strategy, Building Information Modelling (BIM) is standard bearer in the digital transformation efforts.

As such, the EU established the EU BIM Task Group with a 2-year mission to encourage the common use of BIM throughout the EU. Its objective was to produce a handbook of common principles including procurement measures, technical considerations, cultural and skills development.

The handbook is available here in 22 languages including Turkish and Japanese.

Implementation Progress

Forming a unified-BIM implementation across the European Single Market is key to finding new and unique ways of working for the future. BIM implementation can drive down costs as macro economic issues, such as an ageing population, increase national budgetary constrictions.

As such, the European Commission (EC), the executive branch of the EU, underwrote the importance of BIM for delivering public infrastructure projects in Directive 2014/24/EU on public procurement.

BIM reminds a priority for the EU as a foundation stone for growth into the future for the Single Market. Despite centralised efforts, the implementation of BIM is very fragmented throughout Europe.

European-wide Research

In their paper, Azzouz, A. & Hill, P. & Papadonikolaki, E. (2019) compared the progress of BIM implementation in 146 projects of seven European countries: Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain.

The paper measures the progress of the BIM implementation in a BIM maturity score. The highest BIM maturity score is attained by Spain then followed by Netherlands. The highest maturity level is in “document/model referencing and version control” with 79 % of projects using BIM functionality (Azzouz, A. & Hill, P. & Papadonikolaki, E. 2019).

Project file naming and version control is varied: Denmark 100 %, Spain 93 %, Italy 82 %, Ireland 79 %, the Netherlands 77 %, Germany 71 % and Poland 73 %.

Another researched area was the implementation of the BIM Execution Plan, i.e. the manner by which information is exchanged and formalised in BIM processes. Across the 146 projects analysed, 45 % had BEP implementation: Denmark being 100 %, followed by Spain at 93 %.

Current Status of BIM

Given the fragmented nature of BIM in Europe, it is difficult for BIM end-users like you to navigate the different national regulations, bodies and deadlines of all the European Single Market economies.

That’s why Cloudalize has compiled the below table.

  • National Body/Bodies: The national agency/agencies responsible for BIM implementation
  • National BIM Standard: The standard for BIM
  • National BIM Deadline: National deadlines for BIM implementation
  • Comment: Additional information

European Union (EU)

Country National Body/Bodies National BIM Standard National BIM Deadline Comment
Austria Austrian Standards Institute (en) ÖNORM A 6241-1: 2015 07 01 (en) No information found –
Belgium CSTC (fr)

WTCB (nl)

 No information found No information found CSTC and WTCB are the same organisation but with a different name in French and Dutch.

There is a BIM Portal which is supported by CSTC/WTCB in French and in Dutch.
Bulgaria No information found No information found No information found Currently there is no relevant regulation/policy under preparation.
Cyprus None No information found No information found Currently there is no relevant regulation/policy under preparation.
Czechia Ministry of Industry and Trade (MIT) (en)

Czech Standardisation Agency (CAS) (en)

CzBIM (cs)

 No information found 2022 Official government information on the implementation of BIM: BIM Koncepe 2022 (cs)
Denmark Danish Building and Property Agency (en) No information found From 2011 for all projects over EUR 2.7 million
Estonia EVS 928:2016 (en) No information found BIM is mandatory for government projects including the Baltic Rail Project. (et)
Finland Government property management agency uses BIM since 2001: Senaatti (fi) SFS-EN ISO 19650-1:2019 (en)

SFS-EN ISO 19650-2:2019 (en)

 No information found. NGO: buildingSMART Finland (en)

BIM is mandatory in all government contracts.
France Ministry of Housing and Territorial Equality (fr) NF EN ISO 19650-1 (fr)

NF EN ISO 19650-2 (fr)

 From 2017 Official policy document from the Ministry: Plan BIM 2022 (fr)
Germany The Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) (en)

planen-bauen 4.0: official-BIM steering group established by the BMVI (de)

 Deutsches Institut für Normung e.V. (DIN) (en)

DIN SPEC 91400 (en)

  

From 2021 for all transportation and infrastructure projects.

  

 
Greece Technical Chamber of Greece (TEE) (en) ΕΛΟΤ/ΤΕ 22 «Πληροφόρηση – Τεκμηρίωση» (el) No information found
Hungary No information found Hungarian Standards Board (en) No information found NGO: Magyar BIM Szövetség (hu)
Ireland National BIM Council (en)

Entreprise Ireland (en)

The two main ones have been listed. However, there are other engineering and construction associations which are working with the Irish government to implement BIM. These will be listed in full in a forthcoming profile on BIM in Ireland.

 National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI) (en) BIM Level-2 on complex projects from 2019, with medium and simple projects being phased in over the coming years. NGO: Construction Industry Federation (Ireland) guidelines on BIM (en)
Italy Institute for BIM Italy (it)

Government Commission lead by the Administrator of Public Works of Emilia Romagna and Lombardy region, Pietro Baratono.

 Ente Nazionale Italiano di Unificazione (it) Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure. Degree No 508 (it)

From 2019 for all construction projects over EUR 100 million.

From 2022 for all construction projects.

 NGO: Digital BIM Italia (en)
Latvia LatBIM (lv) No information found No information found No information found
Lithuania No information found Lietuvos Standartizacijos Departamentas (lt) No information found There is a technical committee of the national standards agency to draft a Lithuanian standard on BIM.
Luxembourg le Centre de Ressources des techniques de de l’innovation pour le batiment (CRTI.B) (fr)

Digital BIM (fr)

 ILNAS-EN ISO 19650 (en) No information found Following EU standards, not mandatory

Official communication about BIM implementation (fr)
Malta No information found No information found No information found No information found
The Netherlands Rijksvastgoedbedrijf (RVB) (en) RVB BIM Standard v1.0.1 (en) None yet The RGD BIM Standard dates from 2012 and it has not been updated since. 

The adoption of BIM is being driven by private-sector companies.

Poland Ministry of Investment and Development (pl) Polski Komitet Normalizacyjny (pl) None yet Zator bypass as a pilot project: source (pl)

NGO: buildingSMART Polska (pl)
Portugal No national body None yet.

Official communication (pt) on the national standards agency from the head of the BIM Group of the Associação Portuguesa dos Mercados Públicos.

 National BIM Plan is still under consideration by the Portugese Government.  

The University of Minho also plays a key-role in the drafting of the new Portuguese recommendations for BIM application through the CT197 (pt).

There is an academic-lead body between third-level institutions: ptbim (pt).
Romania Official Communication from the Romanian Standardisation Agency (ASRO) (ro) SR EN ISO 19650-1: 2019

SR EN ISO 19650-2: 2019

 None yet Standardised but not mandatory.
Slovakia No national body.

Faculty of Civil Engineering of the Slovak University of Technology (sk)

 STN EN ISO 16739 (en)

STN EN ISO 29481-2 (en)

STN EN ISO 12006-3 (en)

 None yet  

BIM is standardised but not mandatory.

NGO: BIMAS (en)
Slovenia None found Slovenian Institute for Standardisation (SIST) (sl) Standardised but not mandatory NGO: SIBIM (en)
Spain BIM Commission (en) PNE-EN ISO 19650-1 (en) From 26 July 2019,  Mandatory Use of BIM in Public Infrastructure Tenders NGO: buildingSMART España (es)
Sweden None found Swedish Institute for Standards (SIS) en Since 2015, mandatory for all Trafikverket (Swedish Transport Administration) (sv) NGO: BIM Alliance (en)

Journal Article: BIM Standardisation Efforts – the case of Sweden (en)
United Kingdom British Standards Institute (en)

BS ISO 19650-1 & BS ISO 19650-2

 

 Since 4 April 2016, any firm wanting to be considered for large scale public sector construction work in the UK will need to be BIM Level-2 compliant. Very advanced.

The current ISO standard on BIM SO 19650 was written based on the original BS 1192.

European Economic Area (EEA)

Country National Body/Bodies National BIM Standard National BIM Deadline Comment
Iceland FSR – Government Construction Contracting Agency (en) ÍST EN ISO 19650-1 (is)

ÍST EN ISO 19650-2 (is)

 None found NGO Icelandic Association for BIM: BIM Island (is)
Liechtenstein No information found No information found  No information found No information found.
Norway Norwegian Directorate of Public Construction and Property (en) Standard Norge communication on BIM(no) Since 2010 NGO Norwegian association for BIM: buildSMART Norge (no)

Norwegian Homebuilders Association (no) encourages the use of BIM among its members. (no)

 

Switzerland

Switzerland is not a member of the EEA or the EU however, participates in the Single Market with a number of exceptions according to bilateral treaties with the EU.

Country National Body/Bodies National BIM Standard National BIM Deadline Comment
Switzerland Swiss Society of Engineers and Architects (de)

InnoSuisse (de)

 SNV (en) None NGO Association: OpenBIM (de)

NGO Association: BIMConnect (en)

Switzerland lags behind its neighbours in the implementation of BIM standards. Source: The Swiss Construction association, Swissbau (de)

On the Cloud

Cloudalize’s unique platform is perfect for running your preferred BIM-enabled software such as Autodesk’s Revit, Tekla BIMsight, ARCHICAD, SketchUp, Allplan Architecture and many many more. 

Thanks in part to its GPU-powered Cloud desktops, you too can have all the processing power needed with 24/7 access to your BIM projects whenever and wherever you or your team like. 

Contact Cloudalize today to organise a demo of our unique virtual and secure GPU-powered desktop solution.

Book a free demo now

Disclaimer

The information contained in this article was compiled by Cloudalize through its own research. Any additional information was obtained from individuals who work or have worked with BIM in the respective country.

It is intended that this article will be updated periodically to take account of the evolving situation of BIM in the EU, EEA and Switzerland.

While every attempt was made to ensure the accuracy of the article, it is only a reference guide thus please inform the Cloudalize team of any errors which you may have noticed.

Editor’s Note

The links to external website have been identified in the respective language using the ISO 639-2 standard.

Research done by J. Lava, K. Willems and M. Mc Cormack

Bibliography

European Commission (2018) Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs. 2018. Construction. [Online] Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/growth/sectors/construction_en. [Accessed 10 September 2019].

European Commission (2012) COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL Strategy for the sustainable competitiveness of the construction sector and its enterprises. [Online] Available at: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/en/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52012DC0433 [Accessed 10 September 2019].

Council Directive 2014/24/EU of 26 February 2014 on public procurement and repealing Directive 2004/18/EC Text with EEA relevance [Online]. Available from: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32014L0024 [Accessed 10 September 2019]

Azzouz, A. & Hill, P. & Papadonikolaki, E. (2019). Digital innovation in Europe: Regional differences across one international firm.. In Association of Researchers in Construction Management. Belfast, United Kingdom, 30 April 2018. Belfast, United Kingdom: University College London. [Online]. Available from: http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/10055944/1/Papadonikolaki_2018_ARCOM-Digital%20innovation%20in%20Europe.pdf [Accessed 10 September 2019]

Publication date: 18 September 2019