**1. Introduction**

The use of building-information-modeling (BIM) as a promoter of green processes has received considerable attention among practitioners of the construction industry [1]. Given the momentum of BIM and green building applications, many construction companies have sought to leverage green building projects through BIM, in order to realize the synergies between them while achieving sustainability through them [2]. Green building is 'a holistic concept that starts with the understanding that the built environment can have profound effects, both positive and negative, on the natural environment, as well as the people who inhabit buildings' [3] (p. 1). It is 'an effort to amplify the positive and mitigate the negative of these effects' [3] (p. 1). BIM is a 'digital representation of physical and functional characteristics of a facility. A BIM is a shared knowledge resource for information about a facility forming a reliable basis for decisions' [4] (p. 1). The construction industry has been driven to adopt green building strategies from sustainability considerations, such as reducing CO2 emissions and energy dependency on fossil fuels. BIM has been regarded by many to be an opportunity for making the best use of the available design data for sustainable design and performance analysis [5]. The convergence of these separate trends into emerging practice has been referred to as green BIM [1].

BIM's technical advantages were soon joined to help facilitate more effective processes related to budget control, schedules, and environmental data, in an effort to increase green building effectiveness [6]. Green BIM has been perceived as a combination of green building, required to address environmental issues [7], with BIM as a technical tool [8], which serves it. However, incorporating BIM, as a socio-technical system, into green building, as sustainable construction, also requires consideration of the social component involved in achieving effectiveness.

Green building integration with BIM can be presented as one that necessitates coordination among many involved, using sophisticated modeling and system analysis to bring about a sustainable project. This combination requires managerial capabilities to improve efficiency [9]. However, alongside measurement systems—mostly environmental—for green building, and alongside mostly technical indicators—for BIM, there is no benchmarking system for examining these capabilities in green BIM.

In light of the gap in research and practice, with regard to achieving the sustainability goals of green building, while maximizing combination with BIM as a social system—a gap that is expressed in the absence of integration of all stakeholders—a managerial measure is proposed to integrate them and promote sustainable green building. The measure for this implementation of the social system—the integration of BIM in the interactions between all those involved in the project—emphasizes the reliance on an intra-firm organizational structure for the realization of a sustainable purpose. Presenting green BIM as a combination that requires high levels of interaction between participants and complex technology systems, the paper highlights the need for social integration through stakeholder management. The purpose of the research is to explain the importance of addressing this need to achieve effectiveness and to offer it an appropriate response.

In order to refer to the green BIM in this social context, this study uses a corporate-socialresponsibility (CSR) model for BIM application as a benchmark for evaluating this integration and promoting its benefits. From this social point of reference to the agreements and working relationships between parties to a given project, the participation of stakeholders in the organization is examined, and their connection to the construction process is assessed. Considering that industrial practice scarcely includes reference to social components of sustainability, this study suggests bridging the gap using a CSR-based BIM index: the Green BIM Index. This metric refers to the basic question of whether and how social sustainability can be measured [10], by considering a green building project as a means of achieving sustainable benefits, and by presenting practical BIM-based indicators for assessing social sustainability in green building projects. According to the proposed measure, the BIM implementation is calculated by the CSR benchmark for a given project as a standard, and a match is made between its results and the actual BIM implementation results, using social-network-analysis (SNA). The need for collaboration is evident in times of crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, when work is done remotely. A socially-based BIM may help achieve quality as a result of conducting a proper collaborative process.

The index is examined and applied in nine case-studies to confirm its validity and to examine its effectiveness by comparing the actual use of BIM methodology, the social benefits, and the objective effectiveness of the project. In this study, a special emphasis is placed on data quality in order to establish the index. Accordingly, green public projects of the owner-occupier type are carefully chosen and assessed at various project stages, to allow for an appropriate comparison of all model criteria and evaluation. The attempt is to raise awareness of the planning method and the concept of sustainability to achieve success [11]. This demonstration of social integration expands the understanding of CSR as required to implement BIM's social role in the industry while presenting practical means to promote a sustainable green building project.

### **2. Background**

### *2.1. E*ff*ective Green BIM—Social Characteristics and Requirements for Sustainable Benefits*

The integration of the green building with BIM is a combination of a highly complex project-based organization and sophisticated environmental modeling and analysis systems, which require managerial responsibility for achieving broad sustainable benefits. Its characteristics and requirements, as indicated by the literature, are presented below.

In contrast to the traditional work methods, the management of design information and processes integration in green building planning involves a wider range and a larger number of consultants, using sophisticated environmental modeling and analysis systems. A comprehensive understanding of the multi-level interconnections between technologies, people, project phases, processes, and systems is needed to address the green BIM requirements [12]. Green BIM requires consideration of processes and technologies, as well as an information management strategy that supports inter-organizational collaboration for a sustainable project. Hence, the effective management of information is likely to require an extensive dialogue with stakeholders to meet these green BIM requirements. Moreover, in a detailed examination of the integration of BIM technology with green practices, in order to achieve the sustainable environmental benefit, the need to achieve social benefit is revealed. It turns out that alongside the technical issues—which include references to software [13], technical skills [14], and the technological process [15]—there is a need for access [16] and awareness of all the parties involved in the project [17]. Moreover, in evaluating the success factors that can increase the connection between BIM and green building, it has been found that stakeholders have an important part in this, in light of the fact that among the first factors is their level of awareness and involvement [18]. The full application of green BIM thus requires reference to social integration alongside technical integration.

The literature review provides some important insights on optimizing the effective adoption of BIM for sustainability, which involves the need for an appropriate collaborative practice [19]. It turns out that the overall level of collaboration in the common data environment is not at a threshold level enough to realize BIM's full potential [20]. Moreover, conventional contractual measures do not appear to be compatible with the characteristics of BIM. Thus, some studies have begun to examine an integrative approach for addressing social issues. Integrated-project-delivery (IPD) has been proposed to improve communication and collaboration, enabling sustainable achievement [14]. Against this backdrop, the need for empirical research has been raised to learn the best practice of providing BIM for better social sustainability [21].

It is, therefore, possible that the prevailing combination of green buildings and BIM, a combination that has received considerable coverage in the literature [22], does not fully fulfill its purpose. Although BIM has been proposed as a solution to common obstacles in green construction, which include cost overruns and delays related to increasing design and construction complexity, the proposals are required to address the fact that this solution is a function of the full realization of its social dimension. In view of this, a means is needed to examine the realization of BIM's social capacity in this combination.
