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@DRossiter87, thank you for this post. Your explanation of the requirements for a definition to meet the ISO criteria are very helpful. I would like to approach this topic more from the perspective of the business use case and the purpose of the digital twin. Although the ISO/TS 18101:2019 captures certain aspects of the digital twin, I would argue that it doesn’t fully capture what a digital twin is. I think the definition of the digital twin should be driven by the purpose one wants to achieve with it. One could argue that a “digital asset on which services can be performed that provide value to an organization” is a CAD or a BIM-file (digital asset) that is used to export drawings in PDF (services) is a digital twin. From my point of view a BIM in and of itself is not a digital twin. However, the data from BIM can used to create a digital twin. As an asset owner I often have discussions with architects about digital twins and design engineers often confuse the concept of a digital twin with BIM.
- I would say that the power of the digital twin is the ability for the digital representation of the physical object to connect to it’s physical environment through a function of input and/or outputs e.g. by geographically referencing the model and using meteorological data to perform simulations.
- In the operational phase, when the asset owner receives the AIM (according to ISO 19650), the AIM is not yet a digital twin. It’s only when the asset owner connects the digital representation of the object to its physical environment that it actually becomes a digital twin. That could be achieved by e.g. connecting the AIM to an IoT-platform using data from sensors, booking systems etc.
With these criteria in mind I would propose the following definition “A digital representation of a physical object and its interactions with the environment that creates valuable information.”
What do you think?