Brompton Bicycles, London

Every day, our technical consultants and designers deal with a wide range of projects and challenges that require specific knowledge and expertise in smoke control design and installation.

To help us share some of this knowledge with you, we asked them to compile a set of questions and answers for the most frequently queried topics from customers - we ended up with eight subjects:

Car Park Ventilation

Natural vs. Mechanical Ventilation

Smoke Control & Fire Dampers

Environmental Ventilation

CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics)

The Components of a Smoke Control System

When Do You Need Smoke Control in a Building?

Pressurization Systems

In part 1 of this blog, we will cover Car Park Ventilation, Natural vs. Mechanical Ventilation, Smoke Dampers and Environmental Ventilation. To get an email notification when Part 2 is released, subscribe to our blog.

Electric cars are becoming more prevalent and car parks are facing a new risk with the growing numbers of cars being charged in them. This may lead to a number of fires in their lithium-ion batteries, that will pose a challenge to firefighters and to those responsible for safety in the car parks.

Under The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (RRO), the “Responsible Person” (typically a building owner and/or operator) must ensure their smoke control systems are maintained in an efficient state, are in efficient working order and in good repair at all times. If this is you, it is your responsibility to check that contractors have the qualifications, accreditations and training to work in accordance with the latest regulations. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) suggests that the “smoke control system should be maintained by a competent person who is familiar with the fire engineering performance specifications of that specific system”.