Geologists and geotechnical engineers are now looking to more advanced technologies and efficient scientific methods to map the subsurface in 3D and assess its behavior, in order to aid the design of efficient buildings and sustainable infrastructure that together fashion smart cities and environments.

In civil engineering, Building Information Modeling (BIM) is now widely used to “directly model”, update and manage a digital twin of the projected infrastructure to anticipate and coordinate construction. At the same time, the geosciences and in particular geotechnics rely on “indirect modeling” through extrapolation of sampled information and expert knowledge to provide subsurface mapping and assessment of subterranean behavior. Information from both domains contribute to the enrichment of city models, helpful for all city stakeholders, planners and developers.

Those digital transitions are achieved by new technologies, tools and capacities, but also offer challenges that when overcome will certainly facilitate better collaboration between construction actors.

Standardization organizations, such as buildingSMART International (bSI) and the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), offer appropriate forums to address those challenges by facilitating discussion, defining needs and engaging in solution development.
Proper information exchange standards for interactions between those communities must be defined, with initiatives in those domains aligned to progress that collaboration.

Objectives

This workshop is part of a series managed through the IDBE WG, a collaboration between OGC and bSI.

Proposed and organized by the French Geological Survey (BRGM) and the MINnD project, who remain joint hosts of the event, it aims to bring forward the topic of Geotechnical Data Standardization through rigorous discussion, drawing on broad representation across the geotechnical and geoscience community and building on the collaboration framework between OGC and bSI.

Engaging the geotechnical engineering community, the workshop will share knowledge and experience on geotechnical data standardization with the aim to design of an overview map of on-going activities to achieve better collaboration in the adoption of these new digitization technologies.

Draft agenda

Needs and proposition of solutions will be discussed on two connected topics:

            1 – Interface between civil engineering and geotechnical engineering teams;

            2 – From Smart building and infrastructures to Smart Cities.

The workshop will seek to reach a Memorandum of Understanding between OGC and bSI, engaging people and actions to follow the roadmap defined by the geotechnical community.