BIM Based Framework for Underground Caverns Construction

Abstract

Over the past century there has been a dramatic increase in the number of underground caverns for a wide diversity of uses. This includes underground caverns for civil infrastructure facilities such as hydrocarbon storages, hydropower projects, and sports facilities. In 2002 nearly 500 underground hydropower projects were known worldwide. The construction and excavation of the underground cavern is a complex process that includes a large amount of information sharing and management. There has been a substantial amount of research undertaken on the role of BIM for effective management of civil infrastructure such as buildings, roads bridges and tunnels. However, the role of BIM in effective management and operations of underground caverns yet to be explored. To fill this research gap, this study developed a framework for underground caverns information modeling that integrates Excavation, rock support system and scheduling for effective for effective management, construction, and delivery. For this purpose, a detailed literature review and site visits were conducted to understand the construction process of underground caverns and identify the parameters relating to information modeling. The cavern excavation is a cyclic process of drill and blast method that includes heading, benching, drilling blast holes, and rock support elements. Families were created for these using Autodesk Revit to represent rock mass in heading and benching, holes drilling in a specific pattern, and rock support elements such as Rock bolts, shotcrete, and wire mesh. A project case study on underground caverns for Neelum Jhelum hydroelectric power project is presented here to validate the effectiveness of proposed framework. Excavation and rock support models were created based on the families created for C3 lot of NJHP.