Fire Safe Use of Wood in Buildings

With timber being used to construct increasingly large and complex buildings, Ed Claridge, FPANZ National Council Associated Industry Group Representative, writes that the recently published Fire Safe Use of Wood in Buildings: Global Design Guide is a timely world-first reference.

There is a renewed world-wide interest for using timber as a structural and architectural material for many types of building with incentives for using timber including aesthetics, prefabrication, construction speed, economy, seismic performance and increasingly sustainability.

Modern engineered wood products can now be used to construct large and complex timber buildings. Contemporary engineering techniques are enabling construction of timber buildings that were once only possible using concrete and steel, and this is pushing the boundaries of modern fire codes and the basis on which they were founded.

Concern about the fire safety of timber buildings is understandable because it is well known that exposed wood surfaces can contribute to the early stages of a fire and can add to the fuel load in the later stages of the fire. There are also questions around issues such as fire separations, flaming from windows and extinguishment of smouldering wood as the fire goes out.

Despite these concerns, well-designed timber buildings can be just as safe as buildings of traditional materials.

Fire Safe Use of Wood in Buildings: Global Design Guide

This recently published Open Access book is the first of its kind, being a set of global guidelines for the fire-safe use of structural timber and wood products in buildings. The book provides guidance on the design of timber buildings for fire safety with reference to Eurocode 5 and other international codes.

Introducing the behaviour of fires in timber buildings, it describes strategies for providing safety if unwanted fires occur. It also provides guidance on building design to prevent fires from spreading while maintaining the load-bearing capacity of structural timber elements, connections, and compartmentation.

Also included is information on the reaction-to-fire of wood products according to different classification systems, as well as active measures of fire protection, quality of workmanship and inspection as means of fulfilling fire safety objectives. The book concludes with a discussion on firefighting considerations for timber buildings.

Organisation of the Guide

The chapters in the guide can be individually downloaded and are summarised as follows:

Chapter 1 – Timber structures and wood products gives an overview of wood-based materials and construction techniques.

Chapter 2 – Fire safety in timber buildings gives a summary of design principles for providing fire safety in all buildings, with particular attention to timber construction.

Chapter 3 – Fire dynamics introduces the fire dynamics of burning wood, moving from basic physics to compartment fires, and calculation methods for assessing the contribution of exposed wood to the fuel load. Chapter 4 – Fire safety requirements in different regions gives a summary of international regulations for the fire safe use of structural timber elements and visible wood surfaces in interior and exterior applications, presented in tables and maps.

Chapter 5 – Reaction to fire performance describes the systems used for compliance with prescriptive regulations in different regions for internal and external wood surface finishes.

Chapter 6 – Fire separating assemblies gives design principles for timber used as fire-resistance-rated separating assemblies to provide compartmentation for life safety and property protection, including walls, floors, and roof constructions.

Chapter 7 – Load bearing timber structures provides guidance for the structural design of load-bearing timber members exposed to a standard fire, with an overview of the principles needed to predict the effect of charring and heating. Simplified design models include design models from the proposed second generation of Eurocode 5.

Chapter 8 – Timber connections is an introduction to connection typologies, potential failure modes and structural design methods to provide fire resistance to connections in timber buildings. Chapter 9 – Prevention of fire spread within structures gives recommendations for design to prevent fire from spreading into, within and through timber structures, including detailing of construction joints and penetrations.

Chapter 10 – Active fire protection by sprinklers covers the effects of active fire protection systems on design of timber buildings for fire safety.

Chapter 11 – Performance-based design and risk assessment introduces performance-based design of timber buildings, with a summary of possible risk-based design methods.

Chapter 12 – Robustness in fire describes general approaches and design guidance to achieve structural robustness in the fire design of timber structures.

Chapter 13 – Building execution and control provides guidance for design and construction processes to ensure that the fire safety of timber buildings is maintained during and after construction.

Chapter 14 – Firefighting considerations for timber buildings describes firefighting practices that may differ in timber buildings compared with other structural building systems and addresses concerns of fire services specific to timber building construction.

The 462-page guide was developed by the Fire Safe Use of Wood global network, a network of leading fire and timber researchers from Australia, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, Switzerland, Sweden, Russia, United Kingdom, and the USA. Open Access content has been made Available on Taylor & Francis eBook Book platform.

The FSUW is a global network of experts focusing on the fire-safe application of wood in construction and can be found at fsuw.com.