Developing an Industry Oriented Implementation Framework for Integrating Blockchain and Building Information Modelling (BIM) in UK Construction Projects: Enhancing Project Delivery, Commercial Governance, Risk Management and Whole-Life Asset and Sustainability
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Construction projects depend on information produced by organisations with different contractual responsibilities, commercial interests and technical systems. Building Information Modelling (BIM) can structure this information, but the acceptance, provenance and subsequent use of project records remain difficult to govern across organisational boundaries. This paper develops a proposed implementation framework in which a permissioned blockchain supplements, rather than replaces, a BIM-enabled common data environment (CDE). The framework addresses four practical requirements: controlled project information exchange, accountable commercial decisions, traceable risk evidence, and reliable whole-life asset information. A design-oriented method is used to connect documented UK information-management practice with a technically specified implementation proposal. UK case studies, including the HS2 Euston rebar chain-of-custody trial, Crossrail BIM practice, the Cardiff University A556 bridge BIM, blockchain research and Centre for Digital Built Britain supply-chain research, are used to ground the framework in UK delivery conditions. A proposed concerns a hypothetical £30 million public-sector building project, with defined participants, data structures, approval rules, evaluation measures and stop/go criteria. The paper argues that blockchain should be considered only where independently controlled organisations require a shared, verifiable record and where a conventional database cannot meet that requirement more economically. Claimed improvements in payment, programme performance or sustainability must be demonstrated through comparative evaluation rather than assumed from technology.
Authors: Abdul Aziz, Sayed Erfan Kazem, Sohrab Donyavi
Language: English
Subfield: Building and Construction
Field: Engineering
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225785969
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