Fire safety issues when designing ‘green’ buildings

Speaking in a topical session at the IHEEM Wales Regional Conference in Cardiff on 11 May (see also HEJ – August 2023), Anthony Pitcher, Senior Fire Safety Adviser, NHS Wales Shared Services Partnership – Specialist Estates Services (NWSSP – SES), discussed some of the key fire safety challenges when seeking to decarbonise healthcare buildings – for instance those arising from large-scale use of timber as a ‘standout feature’ in building structures, and around the combustion risks from electrical vehicle charging points.

Anthony Pitcher began his presentation – titled, ‘Principles being adopted and challenges to be considered for fire safety and the decarbonisation agenda’ – by admitting that the decarbonisation agenda had ‘caused much recent head-scratching’ among fire safety professionals; currently, there were ‘more questions than answers’.  

Starting by focusing on embodied carbon, he showed a slide of the ‘Construction Materials Pyramid for Embodied Carbon’ – ‘an interactive online tool for comparing the global warming potential of various construction materials’ (Figure 1). He said: “You can see that the materials towards the top of the pyramid (such as steel, concrete, and bricks) are very good from a fire safety perspective, but pretty damning from a global warming one, whereas those at the bottom (such as straw, and wood-based products) are great from a carbon perspective, but all pose a fire safety challenge; they burn nicely.