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Recent Articles of Interest

Fire Suppression & Detection Equipment
Ed Bates, HSB Professional Loss Control
Mine operators must comply with numerous requirements for inspection, testing, and maintenance of fire suppression and detection systems. Standards for inspection and testing go beyond those which are prescribed in the Code of Federal Regulations for mines. This article provides analysis of the fire protection inspection, testing, and maintenance requirements of 30 CFR and explains how the evolving fire protection standards of the National Fire Protection Association can be applied for mining operations. This article originally appeared in the January 2006 edition of Coal Age magazine.

Steam Turbine Fire Protection Will Reduce Repair Costs (Requires Site Registration)
Don Drewry and Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control

What You Think You Know About Industrial Fire Sprinkler Systems Really Can Hurt You
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
When properly designed, installed and maintained, fire sprinkler systems are an effective means of protecting people, equipment and property in industrial and commercial facilities. But mistaken notions about sprinklers and other fire suppression equipment keep many businesses from installing necessary equipment.

Inspection, Testing and Preventive Maintenance for Fire Protection Systems and Equipment
L. Paul Herman, P.E., Professional Loss Control
This paper provides a planning tool to assist facility management in developing a comprehensive program of I,T & PM for fire protection systems and equipment.

Installing Fire Protection Systems: How to Manage Costs, Maximize Effectiveness and Avoid Common Mistakes
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Fire protection at a commercial or industrial facility consists of much more than a few sprinkler heads. A network of engineered systems must all function together to be effective. Unlike most engineered systems, however, installed fire protection systems cannot be tested under actual conditions.

Inspection, Testing and Maintenance of Fire Protection Systems at Electric Generating Plants
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Too often, fire suppression systems fail to operate properly during fires in electric generating plants. In about one-third of these cases, the cause is inadequate inspection, testing and maintenance.

Risk-Informed Fire Protection: Moving Beyond the Educated Guess
Thomas F. Barry, P.E., and Teresa Stone, Professional Loss Control
Corporate restructuring and tight maintenance budgets have fire safety specialists taking a fresh look at ways to control fire and explosion hazards. One result has been a wider interest in fire protection methods developed in highly hazardous industries such as chemical processing and nuclear power generation. This risk-informed, performance-based approach presents a more realistic prediction of potential fire and explosion hazards for a given system or process, or for an entire operation.

Designing for Plant Fire Protection (Requires Site Registration)
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Because of the increasingly competitive nature of the electric power generation market, reduced plant staffing and stricter OSHA requirements for employee fire fighting capabilities, builders of new generating stations need to place increased emphasis on fixed fire protection systems.

Inspection, Testing and Maintenance of Fire Protection Systems at Industrial Plants
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Incidents of fire protection systems failing to operate during an emergency occur every year. These incidents can be minimized by implementing a fire protection system inpection, testing, and maintenance program.

Ten Myths About Industrial Fire Protection
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Misconceptions about fires often come from what we have seen on television or in movies. Many widely held beliefs about fire protection are untrue. Properly installed and maintained systems in all areas of a plant can drastically reduce damage potential.

Balancing Act
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Emergency response remains the key ingredient in industrial fire protections and must be balanced between local fire departments and industrial fire brigades.

Professional Practices
Dominique Dieken, P.E., Professional Loss Control
While a handful of prominent insurers still believe that loss control engineering is a sound investment, the industry's involvement in fire protection design and specifications has been decreasing.

Chapters in the NFPA Fire Protection Handbook, 19th edition:

Fire Loss Prevention and Emergency Organizations
Thomas F. Barry, P.E., Professional Loss Control, and Larry Watrous, P.E., Mustang Engineering, Inc.
Many corporations recognize the threats related to fire loss and the need to establish fire loss prevention and emergency response organizations.

Occupancies in Special Structures and High Rise Buildings
Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control
A brief overview of issues and fire protection features of special structures/high-rise buildings and traditional occupancies in special or unusual structures.

Special Structures
Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Special structures designed for specific purposes and often unique uses present unusual fire protection design problems.

Nuclear Facilities
Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Describes the unique fire protection needs and solutions for nuclear power plants, nuclear research and production reactors, and other facilities handling nuclear materials.

Chapters in the NFPA Building Construction and Safety Code Handbook

Chapter 28, Industrial Occupancies, Chapter 29, Storage Occupancies, and Chapter 30, Occupancies in Special Structures
Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control.

Chapter in the NFPA Fire and Life Safety Inspection Manual, 8th edition:

Radioactive Materials
Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control

Proceedings of the AIChE 2001 Spring National Meeting - Process Plant Safety Symposium

Cost-Benefit Analysis of Fire Risk Reduction Alternatives
Thomas F. Barry, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Risk-Informed, Performance Based fire protection programs assist management decision makers by providing a structured, consistent method to quantify risk, evaluate risk reduction alternatives, and perform cost-benefit analysis. These methods have been applied by HSB PLC at various types of facilities.

Mr. Barry is HSB PLC's Director of Risk and Reliability and is the author of a new book entitled, Risk-Informed Performance-Based Industrial Fire Protection: An Alternative to Prescriptive Codes, published in 2002.

NOTE: If you would like to contact Mr. Barry for more information, please click here.

Proceedings of the National Fire Protection Research Foundation Fire Risk and Hazard Symposium

Fire Protection Engineering Quantitative Risk Assessment
Thomas F. Barry, P.E., and Wayne Holmes, P.E., Professional Loss Control
Presents a systematic approach to evaluating fire-risk-reduction design. The methodology focuses on design objectives while optimizing risk-reduction investment in plant equipment and protection. This provides a risk-based cost-benefit-analysis method for decision making.

SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering, 3rd edition

Quantitative Risk Assessment in Chemical Process Industries
Thomas F. Barry, P.E., Professional Loss Control
The Society of Fire Protection Engineers has released the third edition of the SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering. The Handbook contains an expanded chapter on Quantitative Risk Assessment in Chemical Process Industries written by PLC's Director of Risk & Reliability Services, Thomas F. Barry, P.E.

Fire and explosion risk, which can involve property damage, business interruption, life safety, environmental issues, corporate image, and future profitability, presents a major threat to corporate goals and survival.

"Quantitative fire and explosion risk assessment offers the capability of being able to identify weak links in loss prevention and protection systems before an accident occurs. It also affords the capability of optimizing loss control investments with the greatest allocation going to the area giving rise to the highest risk."

This chapter contains detailed information on risk assessment methods and contains new information on fire protection system performance and design application bases and system response time.

For more information on this subject see Section 5, Chapter 13 of the SFPE Handbook, available from the Society of Fire Protection Engineers. Or contact Tom Barry in Professional Loss Control's Tennessee Office at 865-376-7793, Ext. 2857.