Georeferencing Methods for IFC

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is becoming a standard tool for information management throughout the life cycle of a construction project. Elements in BIM are designed in a Cartesian coordinate system (Engineering system) with no direct relation to the project's geographic location. Accurate georeferencing of BIM data is required both for construction and integration with Geographic Information Systems (GIS), as improperly treated or neglected scale distortions can lead to costly delays in construction as problems requiring ad hoc solutions may arise on site Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) is an open BIM standard developed by buildingSMART, and the current version IFC 4 has recently been extended with IFC Alignment, which includes support for alignment geometries used for infrastructure design. This paper investigates the geographic capabilities of IFC 4 and its extension IFC Alignment. The study identifies a lack of support for non-uniform scale factors and object-specific map projections as the largest weaknesses.