SERVICES
Structural Fire Engineering
Structural fire engineering is a specialist area of fire engineering. It assesses buildings in terms of their fire resistance, usually expressed in minutes or hours; and analyses the true response and behaviour of structural elements in a fire scenario. While achieving a required fire scenario performance in concrete is generally straightforward, with steel there are more options and significant value can be realised by implementing fire modelling to assess the exact fire rating required and structural fire analysis to determine the structural frame’s reaction to real fire conditions.
The added value can be indentified as follows:
- commercial; by achieving considerable savings on Fire Protection for the client or
- visual; in keeping with the architectural aspirations
The main objectives are as follows:
Reducing Fire Rating
Reducing the fire rating of a building can bring significant cost savings to the project. The legislative guidance calls for tall buildings to have a fire rating of at least 2 hours. This can be expensive and excessive in terms of applied passive fire protection. We are able to reduce it, by up to 60 minutes in some cases, by modelling real fire scenarios. We look at the potential fire load, the heat lost through the façade and the resultant heat into the structure, and analyse the exact fire resistance the structure requires in order to meet the life safety requirements of the building act. It is an approach that is fully in accordance with both the Eurocode and British Standards. Often this results in a reduced fire rating being required and considerable savings in fire protection.
Reducing / Omitting Passive Fire Protection to Steel Structures
By reducing the amount of fire protection used in a building, particularly the fire protection to steel members, further savings can be generated. Using performance-based solutions such as the BRE Colin Bailey method or finite element modelling, using Vulcan and SAFIR, structural fire analysis is carried out by analysing the performance and behaviour of those parts of the steel structure subject to elevated temperatures. A single element or 3-D steel floor plate can be analysed to unlock the redundancies within the structure and thus unnecessary fire protection can be avoided.
STOBHILL ACAD
Glasgow, UK
The new Ambulatory Care and Diagnostic centre at Stobhill will be one of Scotland’s largest hospitals; encompassing four floors and covering an area of 30,000m². Patients will experience well-equipped treatment areas and consulting rooms, state-of-the-art theatres and modern, airy waiting areas. It is estimated that in one year alone, the ...
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