The importance of housing construction and its environmental impact have
been argued in the past decades; the increase in housing refurbishment will have
significant implications in the UK economy as the residential sector contributes almost
a third of total UK construction output and more than 87% of 27.6 million housing
stock will still be standing by 2050. Whole house refurbishment seems to be
challenging due to the highly fragmented nature of construction practice, which makes
the integration of diverse information throughout the project life-cycle difficult.
Although Building Information Modelling is becoming increasingly important in the
housing sector in order to enhance the practicality of housing construction and
management, the current uptake of BIM in housing is very low and there are three main
barriers to adopting BIM: business, technical and human problems.
This chapter reviews the current BIM application and its adoption in housing and
investigates an applicable decision support tool to enhance the practicality of housing
information modelling in a way that a traditional life cycle assessment (LCA) or life
cycle cost (LCC) does not. The potential way to integrate both LCA and LCC is
suggested in order to measure the environmental and economic impacts of UK
affordable housing to seek zero carbon homes. The case study demonstrates that what
information is required and how data can be developed from stakeholders’ requirement
in housing construction and management.
Keywords: Building information modelling, Housing construction, Housing
refurbishment, Life cycle assessment, Life cycle cost.
