Building design for At-risk groups

BUILDER seeks to improve fire safety for at-risk groups such as elderly and people with physical and psychological disabilities or addictions. Focusing on safety for these groups, BUILDER will improve our understanding of the different challenges these groups have, suggest safety-solutions for building design, and implement new knowledge from the project to educate civil and fire safety engineers in bachelor, master and Ph.D study programs. At-risk groups are complex and have different challenges, making it important to get a deeper understanding of issues related to each specific group. BUILDER will work together with persons within at-risk groups, their families, social services and fire departments to improve on existing knowledge of these specific challenges. Using this new knowledge, BUILDER will work on designing and implementing new innovative solutions within building design, fire detection and suppression. Fire prevention must also develop as climate changes and new requirements within sustainability emerge. As the use of wood in construction and bio-based insulation are introduced as new ways to reach UNs suitability development goals, reduce safety for the users could be an unintended result. BUILDER will therefore investigate fire in wood constructions and bio-based insulation. Fire spread along outer wooden panelling has been studied through laboratory experiments. Room with flashover and broken window is mimicked by gas fire in chamber with opening. Flame spread along vertical plate above chamber opening is followed. The flame height reaches a maximum and is then reduced, due to charring in the contact region of the flame. Software has been developed to determine flame height and related entities from video recordings. After each run, the charred region is carved out and its geometry (area, depth) is determined by separate measurements. Experiments have been carried out for several sizes (powers) of the imposed gas fire. A total of 60 experiments have been run. The results were published in Fire Safety Journal fall 2022. New experiments are currently performed in the gap between two parallel, vertical plates. This corresponds with the void space between outer and main wall. Voids are often a challenge in relation to fire spread. Changes in climate also results in more challenging wildfires. Understanding how these fires spread will be important for the fire departments as they fight these fires. Understanding how wild fire spread is also important to design prevention measures, as well as define where buildings can be built to ensure their safety. A Master thesis on the modelling av such fires was completed in 2022. Another important topic under the Builder project is new technology for detection and extinguishment of fires. This is particularly crucial for persons in at-risk groups that live alone. Many experiments have been carried out with multi-sensor detection and extinguishing gases, to a large extent through master theses. For these experiments, a full-size flat has been built in Western Norway University of Applied Sciences' Hall of Flame. Experiments on detection have also been carried out at smaller scale, but with a focus on fire safety at home. An article on effects of leakages for application of extinguishing gases was published in 2022. BUILDER will develop and share new knowledge. It is therefore important for the project to communicate new knowledge to industry, fire departments and municipalities. In addition it is important to share new knowledge with students at civil and fire safety programs, enable them to improve knowledge when working on their bachelor, master and Ph.D theses.

Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL) with partners propose a project on fire safety in buildings, with focus on at-risk groups (elderly, people with physical or psychological disabilities, or influenced by drugs or alcohol). At-risk groups are over-represented in fire statistics. Designing safe dwelling for these groups is a major societal concern: The number of elderly living at home is increasing. With new building trends, an insufficient focus on the needs of these groups often follows. We will: + understand better at-risk groups and their challenges, using interviews with user partners (WP1); + develop group-specific design solutions for buildings that support both fire safety and welfare for at-risk groups (WP2); + improve the understanding of fire spread for two cases where at-risk groups are especially vulnerable: tall timber buildings (WP3) and dwellings at the wildland-urban interface (WP4); using experiments combined with numerical models; + investigate new technologies for detection and automatic suppression of fire and their possible use for protecting at-risk groups; using experiments and simulations. HVL-Haugesund trains candidates both at Bachelor and Master level in fire safety, and fire in buildings is a main topic. HVL-Bergen, offering Bachelor degree in civil engineering, is a partner. Research results will be introduced in courses at all these educations. Bachelor and Master theses will be part of the project. Thus, new knowledge will be efficiently transferred to future professionals in the building industry. University of Lund, Sweden, – and NORCE Research Institute, with local experience on at-risk groups, are research partners. User/industry partners include fire brigades, fire-safety consultant companies, building contractors, and startup companies in fire-safety technologies. See Letters of intent from these research, industry, and user partners.