The building industry needs to always maintain pace together with the ‘developments’ all over the world (pun intended?). Be it climatic change, climate adaptation, sustainable living, or technological Advancements like AR/VR or even the Metaverse, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)...these are getting new ‘ground-breaking’ innovations in Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) Industry.
1. Multi-disciplinary Collaboration with BIM
The AEC industry often involves countless disciplines in one project that it is difficult to make a record. Civil Engineers, Architects, MEP Consultants, HVAC Consultants, Contractors, Subcontractors, Clients…finding efficient systems that help in the collaboration of these disciplines gets a project by itself.
By adopting the most advanced technology, the building market is eradicating this challenge. With the use of advanced building construction technology including Building Information Modelling (BIM), cloud collaboration across various disciplines and updates in real-time around the various changes and improvements within the design is possible. From conception to completion, and additional for the operations stage, all the details in connection with project can be kept in are a collaborative virtual model using BIM.
2. Extending our Realities- AR and VR
Another emerging trend in Civil Engineering and construction will be induced using Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR/VR). AR is actually about viewing an inspired world via a lens. The usage of AR permits planning and plotting sites and before breaking ground (are the real deal now). VR is about creating and accessing the virtual world through immersive technology.
Picture this: You develop reveal label of your project using BIM software, and you show it to your clients using VR! Description of how the can walk around the entire project and look everything for their own reasons before construction even begins!
3. Usage of Advanced Materials
With constant innovation in technology and construction techniques, along with the evident climate change and our planets atmosphere worldwide, it is only natural that new materials are being developed. Many of these have already started to be widely adopted throughout the construction industry.
One of the better emerging trends in Civil Engineering may be the recycling of materials which might be difficult to dispose of to be utilized as construction materials. Plastics are increasingly being integrated into roadways and 3D printed projects. Skin tightening and (CO2) that's obtained as a by-product of assorted industrial processes is being injected into concrete during ‘curing’, mixing with other chemicals and forming nanoparticles of limestone imparting for it a great compressive strength.
Self-healing concrete is yet another response to innovation in civil engineering and construction. It gets its ‘self-healing’ properties from calcite-precipitating bacteria, which germinate whenever water enters the cracks in decaying concrete to ‘fill the gaps.’
And that is not even the gist of computer. From kinetic paving, that generates electricity from footsteps, 4D-printed structures which might be able to reshaping or self-assembling over time, to smog-eating buildings that are coated in photo-catalytic titanium dioxide that neutralises air pollutants by reacting with light...other great tales, as well as on.
4. The Fab. Prefab. (and 3D-Printing)
It isn't just the off-site work that's experiencing changes and new means of doing things. New technology and techniques are earning their way to the building site too.
The scope of prefabrication has risen tremendously in the last decade. Especially with the time saved by making use of BIM during the conception and detailing phase of a project, various stakeholders ideate on the material alternatives and scope of prefabrication within the project.
Another interesting wave in civil engineering will be the latest construction technology of 3D Printing. With innovations in techniques and materials, 3D Printed structures are very well on their way to becoming one of several cheapest and quickest methods of construction.
5. Machine Interventions - Reducing the ‘workload’
Using machines such as robots and exoskeletons is an additional trend in civil engineering. Not only do they resolve mundane tasks with ease, they also help increase safety and autonomy on-site during construction.
Exoskeletons are ‘suits’ worn by construction workers on-site, to aid and/or enhance their mobility and workability. Using exoskeletons prevents injuries due to manually handling things and from hand-arm vibration.
Comparatively, Robots completely eliminate the need for the involvement of workers using tasks. Robots are helpful in automating highly repetitive tasks like brick-laying and tying rebar.
6. Building Sustainably
With the usage of sustainable materials and adopting better construction methods on-site, the current trends in civil engineering are emphasizing sustainable buildings.
The use of smart materials baked into buildings run by intelligent electric grids is creating a system of construction which is leading the way to creating more energy-efficient housing. Using innovative ideas like double-skin facades, Solar panels etc. can be increasing this. Efficient spatial planning can also be in focus. In reality, considerations of building sustainability are an integral part of the structure Information Modelling system.
7. Smart Designs
The surveys and inquiries are being carried out using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) or Drones, using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine learning during construction are helping to improve productivity, safety superiority construction.
The world wide web of Things (IoT) is an additional innovation in civil engineering combining a network of structures like smart housing societies that function through detection sensors and energy-efficient methodologies while calculating and analysing their performance after only further improvement in the future. Your data Ecosystem created through such systems is helping within a better demographic and technical analytics of countless neighbourhoods.
In today’s day and age, with innovation and technology driving everything and changing at the rapid pace, it is crucial to maintain your latest construction technology and its particular implication for that industry. The academic curriculum is frequently outdated or lacks enough contact with such new technology in civil engineering and also other relevant fields.
As these trends yield instant results and economic benefits for all stakeholders, employees with a knowledge of such technologies frequently get to find out better career options and faster career growth. Are you aware that employees in BIM roles earn up to 40% higher salaries?
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