ESCO MEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES FACTORY NAMED BEST DIGITAL CONSTRUCTION BIM PROJECT OF 2024
This project, implemented by BE LIVE together with Veikmės statyba and INHUS Engineering, was recognized as the best industrial building and one of the two overall highest-scoring buildings in the digital construction leaders’ competition “Lithuanian BIM Projects 2024.”
The 7,710 m², A++ energy-class factory, owned by Esco Lifesciences, a Singaporean company, was built in Kaunas FEZ in nine months. It is primarily dedicated to fertility clinics, producing laminars, incubators and other medical equipment.
”Building is not what we imagined it to be until recently, for example, before the pandemic, because everything except the physical actions have become digitalised, which allows us to create more sustainable buildings. Time, materials and all other resources are saved at all stages, from design and construction management to the entire life cycle of the building. The result is more sustainable buildings designed, built, and used,” says Darius Kvedaras, BE LIVE Group CEO.
BE LIVE have been providing services to clients based on the increasingly popular EPCM (Engineering, Procurement and Construction Management) model. It is distinguished by the fact that the client entrusts all the services related to the design and construction of the plant to a single contractor.
“The EPCM model allows us to maintain the conceptual and technical integrity of the works and to unify design and construction technologies. When the responsibility is placed in one hand, we get new opportunities, responsibility, and a new level of quality,” says Mr Kvedaras./
Digital BIM design, dynamic energy modeling, building lifecycle analysis, and other digital services are helping to create more sustainable buildings. One of the newer examples is Sitewalk, a service where the progress of the building is periodically recorded with a 360° camera and can be monitored and managed virtually by all participants. This avoids multiple visits to construction sites, makes it easy to check whether work is progressing according to the project, and to react promptly to pre-empt any problems.
“The energy efficiency and environmental solutions adopted at the ESCO Medical Technologies plant illustrate that the green standard is becoming the norm in industry. The new building aims for the highest BREEAM sustainability rating. In addition, ecologists have been consulted on a wide range of sustainability measures, such as installing bird nesting boxes, wood and stone piles for small animals, and other measures contributing to local biodiversity.
The factory site has nesting boxes for several bird species, including storks. These birds are symbolically associated with fertility, as the factory’s production is primarily for fertility clinics.
This is the fourth BE LIVE award in the Digital Building Leaders competition. In its ninth year, the LIETUVOS BIM PROJEKTAI competition awarded prizes in seven categories to innovative public and private sector construction projects implemented using Building Information Modelling (BIM) technologies and methodologies. More than 215 entries were submitted during the competition’s lifetime.
