Use of Virtual Design and Construction, and Its Inefficiencies, from a Lean Thinking Perspective

In recent years, the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry has broadly expanded the use of Virtual Design and Construction (VDC), particularly Building Information Modeling (BIM). However, this use is not always well planned and defined by the companies, which introduces inefficiencies in their VDC use.This research explores the literature to identify examples of waste in VDC from a Lean Construction perspective, and proposes VDC practices and Lean methods to reduce this waste.The exploratory research found examples of 8 waste types in the use of VDC: Non-value added processing, Motion (excess), Inventory (excess), Waiting Overproduction, Employee knowledge (unused), Transportation/Navigation, and Defects