Blockchain technology has the potential to be a transformative force in the construction industry. Here, Dr Eleni Papadonikolaki and Dr Abel Maciel discuss how it works and the role of the Construction Blockchain Consortium in bringing together industry and academia to supercharge its development in the UK
We are in an unprecedented period of technological change and disruption – an ‘Information Tsunami’ consisting of Building Information Modelling (BIM), blockchain technology, artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data analytics etc. These technologies have already shown a profound effect on most sectors, especially financial services, and will clearly cause major disruption in construction. Among them, blockchain technology brings a novelty in storing and recording transactions in a tamperproof way through cryptography.
One of its most famous applications is in the area of digital currencies, flagshipped by the Bitcoin and Ethereum cryptocurrencies. However, apart from strictly fiscal and utility applications, blockchain, because of its peer-to-peer controlled distributed transactional database, can record and confirm various agreements, such as contracts (eg smart contracts, smart-insurance etc.) and transform the business-to-business ecosystem. Due to the lack of central authority, it offers democratised and transparent flows of information using a permission-less and censorship-resistant approach. For these and other qualities, blockchain technology is also known as the ‘Trust Protocol’.
BIM and Blockchain: Made for each other?
The construction industry is notoriously characterised by fragmentation in information flows, processes, services and firms. Undoubtedly, one of its persistent problems is the disconnect between design and construction. This disconnect is mainly due to the lack of open and trustworthy information across the supply chain. Blockchain technology has the greatest potential in construction to averting these effects through the use of open and transparent transactions.
Apart from minimising the interfaces between design and construction, blockchain technology can contribute to improving both fields in their own right. First, blockchain can facilitate Computer Supported Collaborative Work (CSCW), and Computational Design in general, by enabling transparent information flows.
Second, blockchain technology could nicely complement information and change management in Building Information Modelling (BIM) systems, both authoring and managing tools. Thereafter, leveraging smart contracts and trusting environments, blockchain technology can improve supply chain management and logistics control.
Through the use of ‘intelligent’ building components designed via BIM, blockchain offers new ways to manage the flow of materials, contracts and payments across the supply chain. This not only guarantees a chain or accountability and responsibility, but also brings the principles of the circular economy closer to the construction industry.
Similarly, a decentralised, industry-wide construction blockchain leveraging from the use of sensors and the Internet of Things could create a “ledger of things” to manage key transactions in transportation, infrastructure, energy, waste or water. This could be the ultimate function of digital transformation in construction.
technology at the IoT Blockchain Solutions Forum in Barcelona last September
Mission of the Construction Blockchain Consortium
All this indicates that there are many technologies and potential applications, whose exploration is key for the industry. Given that companies often do not have time, skills and resources to monitor technology, the Construction Blockchain Consortium (CBC) [Link – https://www.constructionblockchain.org/] aims to fulfil this role.
The CBC leverages technologies to enable disruption in the construction industry.
The consortium started as a collaboration between University College London’s (UCL) Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment and the Department of Engineering. It lies at the intersection of industry and academia, offering three main strategic functions:
- Knowledge transfer: To track and distil the escalating range of technologies and tools that are emerging.
- Research and Development (R&D) to the whole construction ecosystem: To build pre-competitive proof-of-concept systems and generate IP.
- Education and training: To enhance and redevelop the knowledge and expertise of staff required to deploy the new technologies.
Learning from models like the R3 Consortium, [Link – https://www.r3.com/] a blockchain technology company that coordinates a consortium of over 70 banks in knowledge transfer and R&D of blockchain in financial services, a consortium dedicated to the construction sector would seem a timely idea.
The CBC also has strong links to UCL’s recently established inter-departmental UCL Centre for Blockchain Technologies. [Link – http://blockchain.cs.ucl.ac.uk/] Apart from the synergies in the area of BIM, other themes of interest include:
- Legal.
- Financing.
- Culture & change.
- Design, construction & safety.
- Building services.
- Energy & sustainability.
- Smart cities & social welfare.
- Policy & compliance.
Activities of the Construction Blockchain Consortium
We are an open platform for matching demand for blockchain applications in the construction industry and the wider built environment. We supply research ‘horsepower’ from the academic world. Since the launch of the CBC in November 2016, we have been engaging in knowledge transfer through meetings and workshops, where primarily UCL and its partners provide content and space. The CBC organises four half-day meetings per year (with 50-100 participants) and 11 smaller workshops with 30-50 participants.
So far, over 17 meetings and workshops have been organised, attended by 300 participants from key stakeholders in the industry.
Our key objective in the R&D aspect is to develop a framework and deliverables of open source software. Any technology developed from CBC will be available to industry and academia for further development as open source or proprietary technologies. To this end, a number of open source licences could be used to permit reuse within proprietary software, eg the MIT licence. The ultimate and overarching goal of the CBC is to develop blockchain technologies that would be integrated with Building Information Modelling (BIM) and other exciting technologies that increasingly change the construction ecosystem.
Construction Blockchain Consortium Partnerships
CBC builds upon collaboration and is essentially an industry-academia partnership. The consortium is industry-led, comprising both industry competitor companies (depth), as well as what might be described as companies across the industry ecosystem (width). The role of academia, and in particular UCL, is to provide stability in a neutral environment and access to state-of-the-art research. Other academic partners include King’s College London, the Centre for Construction Law and Imperial College London.
The industry component of the CBC is very strong, comprising both firms from the built environment (among others Foster & Partners, Zaha Hadid
Architects, Skanska, KPMG, Arcadis UK and Beale Law), as well as continuous engagement with the vibrant digital developers’ community in London.
Recently, we have been awarded a membership to the Hyperledger project, a global project for open source blockchain technologies and related tools, started in December 2015 by the Linux Foundation. The new association will support the collaborative development of blockchain-based distributed ledgers.
Outlook and next steps
The CBC is becoming a global community and is now at the final stage of its partnership membership formation. Approximately 40 organisations from the construction and IT sector have formally expressed interest to partner with the CBC, which is equitable to participation in the CBC board and governance. Formal announcements are expected in spring 2018.
If you or your organisation would like to be a CBC member, participate in and support our activities and join our research network, please visit our website, Meetup and Slack communities. All community links can be found on www.constructionblockchain.org.
Dr Eleni Papadonikolaki
Lecturer in BIM and Management at UCL and
CBC Steering and Technical Committee Member
University College London
Tel: +44 (0)20 3108 3219
www.constructionblockchain.org
Dr Abel Maciel
Director of the CBC
Design Computation
Tel: +44 (0)203 036 0927
abel.maciel@designcomputation.com
www.constructionblockchain.org
www.meetup.com/Construction-Blockchain
