ISO 29481-1:2016 Building information models – Information delivery manual – Part 1: Methodology and format, was published on 1 May 2016. This is a revision of the first edition from 2010. The development has been done by WG 8, with Convenor Henk Schaap (NL) and Project Leader Jan Karlshøj (DK).
The standard has undergone a major review in the light of refined approaches to the development of information delivery manuals, IDM, and their technical implementation in software readable forms.
Building information modelling, BIM, provides a digital technology for describing and displaying information required in the planning, design, construction and operation of constructed facilities. Increasingly, this modelling approach is expanding to cover all aspects of the built environment, including civil infrastructure, utilities and public space. This approach to managing information brings together the diverse sets of information used during the life cycle of the built environment into a common information environment, reducing, and often eliminating the need for the many types of paper documentation currently in use.
An information delivery manual, IDM, provides help in getting the full benefit from a BIM. If the required information is available in the BIM to support a construction process, and the quality of information is satisfactory, then the process itself will be greatly improved.
For this to happen, there needs to be a common understanding of the processes involved across the entire life cycle development of a built environment project.
ISO 29481-1:2016 provides a basis for reliable information exchange for users so that they can be confident that the information they are receiving is accurate and sufficient for the activities they need to perform.