Fresh report from SFPE Denver Conference!

So finally, I'm back blogging again. Parental leave in 2015 and other stuff came in the way and it can sometimes be hard to prioritize social media to other tasks at work. 

SFPE's North America Conference and Annual Meeting is right now going on in Denver and I've been here since Friday. Many things are going on in the society and we're soon coming to the end of year two of the three year strategic plan (2015-2017) that we worked on in 2014, which was my first year on the board of directors. I am very glad to see that things are rolling along well; the chapter model is being looked over, the new committee structure is running well, a democratic election system for society's leadership and much more. All in all, I think we are well under way to meet the needs of our growing number of SFPE members and chapters, and most importantly - with a global perspective too.

Board meetings start early and finishes late - lots of things to be covered in the two face to face meetings that we have each year (the other are online meetings).

Board meetings are long days, where many have travelled far for the meetings. In the evenings there's a board meeting at a local restaurant. At the board dinner in Denver we thanked the two board members whose terms are up at the end of the year and who are not up for reelection. I've been fortunate to be able to work with Mike Madden for my three years on the board and he's been doing a great job as president of the society, showing strong and wise leadership. John Woycheese has been on the board for two years with me and like me, he also represents a non-US region - Middle East - which has been welcome and refreshing, adding to the board's global perspective. A big thanks to both for excellent service on the board!

Director John Woycheese receiving a gift from current president Milosh Puchovsky.

Immediate past president Mike Madden holding a great thank you speech to the board.

At Sunday the second day of the board meeting continued and now was the time for the five committee chairs to report to the board. In their reports they give an overview of ongoing activities, subcommittees and also point out areas where directions and decisions from the board is needed. SFPE is dependent on all the good work done by volunteers in the committees and we are grateful to all those walking the extra mile.

Committee chair Paul Hart and president Milosh Puchovsky discussing the increased focusing on online content.

People start to arrive for Sunday afternoon's Chapter Leadership Forum, SFPE Annual Business Meeting followed by the President's Welcome Reception and Expo Opening. All in all - great opportunities to catch up on what's happening in SFPE, how the strategic plan is coming along, and not least networking with fellow members in the fire safety engineering community.

Live report from SFPE Annual Meeting!

SFPE President Carl Baldassara opens the Annual
Meeting and reveals the new logo!

SFPE is right now holding our Annual Meeting which is followed by the conference, seminars and events all pertaining to fire safety engineering and fire protection engineering. The meeting and conference is in Long Beach, CA this year.

As a member of the SFPE board, I'm happy to say that we're now launching a strategic plan that's bold and exciting. SFPE is rebranded with a new logo, with the clear message "Engineering a Fire Safe World". More information will follow on the SFPE official web page, blog and other media, as we roll out the new strategic plan.

A very interesting week will follow in Long Beach with great possibilities for networking and professional development. Today we also have specific events for young professionals within the Alliance of Young Engineers, awards ceremonies tomorrow and a lot more things coming up! See the full program at the top link.

And don't miss the live feed on Twitter from the conference: #SFPE2014 - stay tuned!

SFPE Europe Working Session in Switzerland

Evening entertainment at the Eurofire conference 
that followed the SFPE Europe meeting.

On the 8th of October a meeting and working session was organized by SFPE Europe in Basel, Switzerland. SFPE Europe is actually called the European Chapters Coordination Group (ECCG) and formally consists of the national chapter leaders. The group meets about 2-3 times a year and focuses on the development professional fire safety engineering in Europe.

Some reports from the meeting regarding SFPE:

• It's great to see that new chapters are formed! Most recently, there's the new student chapter formed by Edinburgh University.
• Also, it's great to see that several European countries are considering the formation of new chapters. Anyone interested, feel free to contact me!
• SFPE HQ has found a new executive director, Nicole Testa Boston, which is great! Welcome Nicole!
• The ECCG has now been formalized and there will be a one year term for the SFPE Europe president. It's now being lead by Jean-Claude de Smedt from Belgium.

The working session itself was titled "Professional recognition and qualification of fire safety engineering/engineers" and was moderated by Robert Jönsson. Last year SFPE Europe conducted a survey on the status of fire safety engineering in Europe. The results showed that fire safety engineering is progressing in Europe, but also that there are large differences in what we mean by FSE. There are also big differences in how we measure and require competence as well as qualification of practitioners. These are of course vital elements to ensure a high quality of fire safety engineering work. Below you will find the presentation I made in Switzerland at the working session and the Eurofire conference.



The presentation of the status in Europe set off a discussion about what we need in the European countries. Robert and I had prepared background information, including a lot of excellent material already being done by others. These questions has been raised before, and will again.

Some of the key conclusions were:
- There is a need for operational standards, or job descriptions, of what fire safety engineers do
- These descriptions may be matched when defining model curriculum or contents of educational programmes. See SFPE:s BSc curriculum and strategy/core competences.
- Short courses are needed for professional development of existing practitioners, and also to raise awareness and knowledge of the fire safety engineering field among other disciplines.

These are just some of the questions that SFPE Europe will continue working on. For more information, feel free to contact me!

BIV-Konferens om BBR 19, 30-31/5

I slutet på maj så anordnar BIV en stor konferens om tillämpning av de nya byggreglerna. Temat är mycket aktuellt då övergångstiden för de nya byggreglerna gick ut vid årsskiftet. Vi  märker tydligt inom BIV att det är många frågor om tillämpning som cirkulerar bland våra medlemmar!

Missa inte att boka in dessa dagar! Anmälan kommer att vara öppen på BIVs hemsida om ett par veckor.

I föreningen har vi jobbat med tillämpningsfrågorna på flera sätt, och en hel del nyheter kommer att presenteras på konferensen. Under 2012 startade vi tre stycken tillämpningsgrupper inom specifika områden, och resultatet av dessas arbeten kommer att presenteras.

Tillämpningsgrupperna är (inkl. länk till remiss):

• Br0-byggnader
• CFD-modellering
• Kontroll av brandskydd i byggprocessen

Två av dessa har varit ute på remiss, och Br0-remissen planeras att snart gå ut. Syftet med arbetet är att ge ett stöd för tillämpning i dessa områden där lagar och regler ofta lägger ett stort ansvar på den enskilde. Exempelvis är projektören skyldig att använda CFD-modeller på rätt sätt, kontrollen förväntas bli utförd inom byggherrens organisation och för Br0-byggnader ges endast begränsad vägledning från Boverket. Det finns därmed ett stort behov av ett stöd för tillämpning! Och det är mycket positivt att vi har fått ett stort engagemang i samtliga dessa grupper. Mellan 5-10 personer har varit aktiva i varje grupp och dessa har lagt ner mycket tid och engagemang i arbetet. Detta är vi givetvis tacksamma för - aktiva medlemmar utgör kärnan i vår förening.

BIV kommer fortsätta bedriva arbete inom stöd för tillämpning under 2013/2014. Vi tar gärna emot idéer på tillämpningsprojekt. Skicka gärna sådana idéer till mig innan 15/5. Ange gärna om ni själva är beredda att driva någon särskild fråga. Jag kommer att ta tillfället i akt på konferensen och lyfta dessa idéer!

Inför konferensen har vi också gjort en särskild satsning i lokalgrupperna. Stockholms lokalgrupp har redan haft första träffen och den var mycket lyckad! På träffen deltog nästan 30 personer och bland annat då diskuterades verksamhetsklasserna. Göteborg och Malmö har också träffar på gång då olika tillämpningsfrågor ska diskuteras. Resultatet kommer att lyftas på konferensen.

Lokalgrupperna har träffar enligt följande:
Stockholm 11/3 
Göteborg 8/4
Malmö (inbjudan kommer snart)

Boverket kommer att vara på plats på konferensen och presentera vanliga frågor som har lyfts om BBR. Med bred representativitet från branschen så har vi alla förutsättningar för underlätta tolkningar och minska gråzonerna i BBR. Det kommer med andra ord bli en spännande konferens med många intressanta diskussioner!

SFPE Engineering Technology Conference

It's been a great and interesting day at the SFPE Annual Meeting. The Engineering Technology Conference is going on the first two days. There has been numerous good presentations, award ceremonies and reports from the SFPE organization.

I'm proud of the several prizes that Sweden received (see SFPE Sweden homepage, in Swedish: http://www.sfpe-biv.se/nyheter/nyhetsarkiv/10089-prisregn-oever-svenskar-i-usa). Most notably, I must say, is the price to Robert Jonsson for his great effort in mentoring and inspiring at the fire safety engineering programme in Lund. More than 700 students have graduated and Robert is the key person to the successes of the Lund program. A big congratulation to him!

Great presentation were made by Nina Hansen, Denmark, on fire risk assessments in tall residential buildings. I'm sure this may be interesting for the SFPE Sweden's group that currently are looking at fire safety verification of buildings were pre-accepted solutions are not valid, including buildings with more than 16 stories.

My colleague, prof Ulf Wickström, is holding his presentation of a new formula
for calculating time to ignition of solids.

My colleague professor Ulf Wickström presented a simplified formula for calculating time for ignition of solids. Validation with numerical methods show great accuracy and big improvements compared to previous methods.

Kristofer Overholt from Texas University presented a really interesting study on fire penetration into void spaces. Experiments and analytical models were compared. Also, the effect of natural vs PPV ventilation were studied. Fires into the construction is very relevant in Sweden nowadays. We have a good understanding of predicting and analyzing room fires, and the fire brigade are using great tactics. But when it comes to fires in the structures we need more knowledge and new methods. With growing fire damage costs, this is definitely an area where more research is needed.

One interesting conclusion is that the use of PPV may effect the fire behavior and increase the risk of a smoldering fire to a flaming fire. Kudos to Kris at University of Texas, Austin, for great work in the area.

SFPE Annual Meeting: Fire Safety Engineering in Europe

This week I'm participating at the SFPE Annual Meeting in Savannah, GA. Savannah is great with warm weather and a welcome change from the cold autumn winds back in Sweden. I'll be reporting from the conference at the blog. More information about the annual meeting is found here:

http://www.sfpe.org/SharpenYourExpertise/Education/2012SFPEAnnualMeeting.aspx

This morning I'll be holding my keynote speech on Fire Safety Engineering in Europe - which you may see below!

Fire Safety Engineering in Europe - Opportunities and Challenges on Prezi

Risk levels analyzed in new Swedish building regulations

In the afternoon session yesterday two Swedish fire consultancy companies presented a comparison of risk levels in the old vs. the new regulations. Mainly, the prescribed design parameters, such as the 2 & 10 MW HRR were analyzed. Analyzing risk levels is welcome and there's actually several similar projects going on now in Sweden.

However, some decisions and assumptions were made that may have led to another result.
- Minimum levels are not aspirational, individual practitioners are responsible for choosing a relevant design fire at, or above, the minimum level. Assuming that all consultants choses the lowest safety level is something they are liable for themself.
- Involved companies were not chosen to be statistically representative. Companies on the other ends of the scale may have been excluded. There are examples of design being performed previously where robustness (probably) were not handled at all - whereas the analyses assumes that all companies tested robustness.
- Many data in the analysis were lacking for the Swedish situation and thus data from other sources were used. This introduces uncertainty in the model.
- Difference in the suggested design HRR and the HRR of the consultants is just one factor affecting risk. Other factors, such as fire growth, may have a greater significance.
- A question that was not raised in the presentation is what risk the risk level should be? Could the analyzed values from the consultants have been over-conservative?

The article has great value in starting a discussion, even though no scientifical conclusions may be drawn. It's obvious that there's a great variance in how the previous regulations were applied. Risk levels will now be more conformed with greater societal control.

Further questions must certainly be discussed - what risk level do we get with nationally set values? One question that also is relevant is what the risk level should be? One way would be to compare with the risk levels of prescriptive regulations or with regulations in other countries - and to look more into factors affecting risk levels.

--
The Nordic countries are well represented at the conference. There's some 15-20 Swedes of the 160 participants. In the picture you see Swedish and Icelandic representaties - at the table blocking the emergency exit ;)

Presenting the Swedish fire safety regulations in Hong Kong

Today was the start of 9th International Conference on Performance-Based Codes and Fire Safety Design Methods in Hong Kong. SFPE is hosting the conference at hotel Excelsior.

Hong Kong by night just outside my hotel.

I was presenting together with my former colleague, Caroline Cronsioe, who works at Boverket/The National Board of Housing Building and Planning. We also have two co-authors, David Tonegran from Tyréns and Henrik Bjelland from University of Stavanger.

The topic of the paper is the new Swedish building regulations that were implemented

Link to our paper

Link to our presentation

Some reflections after today is that several countries have mixed experience with performance-based design (PFD). Low competence among regulators may rule out that possibility - prescriptive is more well known. In other cases lack of guidance has led to varying and insufficient fire safety. Give the same problem to ten fire safety engineers and you'll have ten different answers.

This is one reason to why countries such as New Zealand and Sweden starts "prescribing" design values and criteria. There's obvious parallels of structural safety where design loads and resistance have been set nationally for years. It's quite reasonable in my opinion that we set the societal risk level nationally. Compare with road safety where speed limits are natural today but weren't implemented until risk awareness grew. However, more work will be needed on calibration of risk levels for fire safety. Here, international collaboration is welcome - and the conference is an arena for discussing such ideas.