My Role: For this project, I was asked to join and lead an existing relationship between the Autodesk sustainability team and Factory OS. We developed a research agenda that became the primary focus of the relationship. I negotiated the terms of the collaborative research, and as the director and executive sponsor, led the project until 2023.
The team consisted primarily of AEC Industry Futures researchers, but also designers and engineers who defined the research problems, developed new science (as well as a new experience ) and built completely novel technology. Designers at Factory OS were able to test the prototype to help validate the utility in their day-to-day workflows and it was applied towards an affordable, sustainable housing project in Oakland, California.
But in an area known for its permitting nightmares — especially in San Francisco, where putting up housing takes nearly a year longer than anywhere else in the state — all that computer brain power could find itself wrapped up in red tape.
A bevy of cutting-edge products promise to use sophisticated generative AI — think ChatGPT, but in 3D — to automatically run code-compliant wiring through digital buildings, imagine fantastical structures from a sketch, and schedule contractors down to the minute.
Research from Autodesk taked into account ~10 building criteria, ranging from cost to carbon footprint to ease of living.
In addition to accelerating and improving design, there is great opportunity in transforming construction. The global population is expected to grow by two billion people in the next 30 years. To create enough housing, workplaces, and schools for this urbanized population, the equivalent of a New York City’s worth of buildings must be constructed every month until 2050. And this must be done at the same time as eliminating net carbon emissions from the built environment.
Current construction processes are far too slow and carbon-intensive to meet the challenge. Construction needs to be reinvented, and one way to do this is through manufacturing buildings in a factory. This allows buildings to be more like products than one-offs, and it reduces waste, time, and cost while enhancing safety and reliability. This application of manufacturing principles to the built environment is known as industrialized construction.
“Architecture and buildings is about 40% of the global carbon problem,” said David Benjamin, director of architecture, engineering, and design research at Autodesk, whose team applied the software to the project.
The impossible problem that AI can help with is how are we going to drastically increase the total amount of floor area while we’re drastically decreasing the total carbon emissions from all buildings? Using the parameters of the former Phoenix site and the fixed dimensions of the Factory_OS units, the team modeled how seven smaller structures and one large bar-shaped building could be moved around to optimize for green space, walkability to BART, sunlight, noise reduction and other criteria.
AI software from Autodesk and others promises to design affordable housing and other buildings better and faster.
The builders of The Phoenix, Factory_OS, have cracked the code for industrialized construction. They use rapid factory production to build housing modules that can be trucked to project locations and assembled by crane. To quickly move models from design to production to residents moving in, the team harnesses Autodesk’s cloud-based workflows for collaboration.
With a focus on prefabrication, this innovative process removes the unpredictability of a traditional construction site. And the convergence of design, construction, and manufacturing workflows dramatically accelerates the speed to completion. The Phoenix units will be erected in about two weeks whereas traditional processes typically take close to a year.
