When to engage a fire safety engineer

Engaging a fire engineer at each project stage

The earlier a fire engineer is involved in a project, the greater the benefits that can be realised in the design. Fire engineers should be considered partners in the design of a building. An attentive fire engineer will have the best interests of your design at the forefront of their fire safety strategy and will focus on ensuring your design intent is realised while promoting life safety and property protection. Refer to the Ready reference table at the end of this note for a summary of each stage of engagement, the deliverables and common fee structure.

Early-stage involvement

While fire engineers have not been typically engaged during the early stages of a project (project initiation and conceptual design), many critical design decisions made at this stage could benefit from the value engineering offered by fire engineers. Many early design decisions are based on an understanding of the Deemed-to-Satisfy (DtS) requirements of the National Construction Code (NCC), whereas a performance-based fire engineering approach can be adopted to enhance the design. An experienced fire engineer can recognise such opportunities at the early stages of a project.

By seeking advice from a fire engineer as you develop a design concept, you’ll gain confidence that your design will be feasible from a fire safety perspective. At this stage, a fire engineer can help you determine essential fire safety elements of the project, from locations of egress stairs to the optimal structural forms for safety.

Fire engineers are designers. They are trained to assess a building’s response to various fire conditions, particularly in the context of expected human behaviour. For example, you may be designing a podium style building and instinctively design the fire-isolated stairs to go all the way to ground level. Consulting a fire engineer at the early design stage can identify which fire-isolated stairs could discharge to the podium (and the architectural impacts of adopting that approach). This could potentially free up key areas within the podium levels enabling them to become lettable space.

Performance-based fire engineering can produce bespoke solutions that meet the Performance Requirements of the NCC while saving your client time and money and retaining the integrity of your design.

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Developing your design and fire engineering

A fire engineer is typically engaged during a project’s detailed design phase.
At this stage, some fire engineers may wait to receive a report of NCC non-compliances from the certifier/building surveyor before starting their assessment of the proposed design. However, a proactive fire engineer should start their evaluation without waiting for direction from the certifier/building surveyor.

Engaging a fire engineer before the certifier/building surveyor can be advantageous. This is because they can assess your design holistically, from first principles, rather than simply addressing deviations from the DtS Provisions. The fire engineer can assist you and other consultants by confirming what can be justified through fire engineering analysis and may identify opportunities to elevate your design.

At this stage, the fire engineer should also be communicating what fire safety features are required to justify the proposed Performance Solutions. The resulting fire safety strategy is generally documented in a Fire Engineering Brief (FEB).

Note that if a fire engineer is not engaged at this stage, the builder will likely engage one at a later stage and could benefit from construction cost savings that result. It therefore makes sense to engage a fire engineer (or strongly recommend that one is involved) as early as possible on a project to have control over the design’s realisation and to optimise all aspects of the design.

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Detailed design and documentation

On some projects, the need for a fire engineer isn’t identified until late into the detailed design and documentation phase. A fire engineer can still assist the project team with a Performance Solution at this stage. However, the number of ways to resolve an issue will be more limited. Generally, the design will have progressed so far that there will be few or no design enhancement opportunities.

Whether the fire engineer has been involved for most of the project, or only for a short time, they must prepare a Fire Engineering Report (FER) to accompany the construction certificate/building permit/approval application for all projects where the design incorporates a fire-related Performance Solution.

When a Design and Construct (D&C) contract is used, the appointed builder may engage a fire engineer to realise cost savings in the design or adopt an alternative construction technology that shortens the program. It makes sense for the builder to use the incumbent fire engineer in such cases. If you can establish a good relationship with a dependable fire engineer early in the process, they will be encouraged to have the best interests of your design front of mind and will advocate for it to the builder.

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Fire engineering during construction

The construction phase of any building project can present challenges that were unforeseen during the design stages. If problems occur in the fire safety space, the advice of a fire engineer is critical to help solve these issues. The fire engineer can find best-for-project solutions within the constraints of what has already been constructed.

A fire engineer can advise whether Performance Solutions can help solve a construction issue or whether adopting the DtS compliant approach is likely to be best for the project. Suppose that an additional Performance Solution is the best option. In this case, the fire engineer will prepare a revised version of the FER to form part of a revised construction permit, building approval or the like.

As the construction phase nears completion, a fire engineer can add significant value in streamlining the approvals process by undertaking inspections. The fire engineer can attend site for witness testing to verify that the fire safety systems are all fully integrated, helping to maintain subconsultants and subcontractors’ accountability.

For example, if a design requires an automatic sliding door to close upon sprinkler activation, the door contractor, wet fire contractor, and dry fire contractor each have a part in the design. However, none of these individual contractors will typically take ownership of the integrated design. The fire engineer can provide independent verification that the systems operate together as intended.

The fire engineer can also independently verify that other non-active fire safety requirements, such as fire rated construction and fire sealing of service penetrations, have been correctly implemented. This helps the fire brigade and the building surveyor/certifier to sign off on the fire safety design as part of the building’s final inspection.

This independent verification process will be documented in multiple site reports and a fire engineering signoff letter. In some states and territories, the fire engineering signoff letter must be provided under the state/territory Building Act/Regulation.

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When fire engineering reporting is required

The first instance where the project team needs documentation/reporting from a fire engineer is when applying for a construction or building permit/certificate (as related to requirements by Building Acts and Regulations in each state and territory). Here, the FER documents the fire-related Performance Solutions that form part of the design.

However, there are other deliverables that a fire engineer can provide throughout a project that can be helpful and sometimes critical to the success of the project. A letter of advice or Consultant Advice Notice (CAN) may be provided by the fire engineer in the early stages of a project to document the general direction of the fire engineering or to outline a key fire engineering design decision.

During design development, a FEB provided by the fire engineer often becomes a critical document for other subconsultants such as the mechanical engineer, wet fire and dry fire engineers, structural engineer and of course, the architect. The FEB is intended to document the fire safety strategy for the building as well as detailing what fire safety matters are proposed to be addressed in the FER. The FEB will outline any inputs and assumptions that will be used in the forthcoming fire engineering analysis. A FEB may include a preliminary schedule of works that provides an overview of the specific fire engineering requirements that are likely to be required.

Note that the FEB is a special type of performance based design brief, which is required to be prepared and provided in association with any design that does not conform with the NCC DtS Provisions (refer to NCC 2022 Volume 1, Clause A2G2(4) / NCC 2019, Volume 1, Amendment 1, Clause A2.2(4)).

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Typical fee structures

Unlike some other consultants, fire engineers’ fees are not closely tied to the size of the proposed building. Fire engineering fees are more likely to be based on the complexity or uniqueness of the building design. Complex structures are less likely to conform to the NCC DtS Provisions and will likely need more fire engineering input.

As outlined above, the main deliverables provided by a fire engineer are the FEB and the FER. These are typically structured under a fixed fee arrangement. The fee will be developed based on the following factors:

• The number of fire engineering issues to be addressed (ie more issues = more time required to deliver the service = more value to the project).
• The nature of the issues to be addressed (eg is the fire engineer justifying egress of a small number of maintenance staff from a plant room or egress of 100 residents from an aged care facility?).
• The level of rigour that will be required to justify the proposed design (eg is specialist computer fire modelling needed to demonstrate to the fire brigade or building surveyor? If so, the fee will be higher).
• The overall benefit to the project that results from the fire engineering (eg if a structural fire engineering solution justifies the omission of passive protection to structural steel and that represents significant construction cost savings, it’s expected that fire engineering should share a small part of that realised value, by way of an increased fee if expected cost savings are significant.

A fire engineer may propose an hourly rate fee for other fire engineering services, such as general advice and design input. Under this structure, the fire engineer usually charges for their time and outlays (including phone calls, meetings, etc). This approach is common in instances where there is no defined deliverable, or the extent of the services is unknown when the fee is agreed. This approach has the advantage of only costing the project as much as is needed. Most firms are willing to set an upper limit on their hourly rate for transparency in understanding consultancy costs. A fire engineering firm may charge different hourly rates depending on who in their team works on the project (eg a junior vs senior fire engineer). Other firms may apply the same hourly rate for all staff.

Fees for the involvement of a fire engineer during construction can be a fixed fee overall, or a fixed fee per inspection, or an hourly rate.

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Ready Reference Table

The following table provides a summarised version of watchpoints when engaging a fire engineer:

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About the author

Mathew Freeman, MFireSafetyEng, BEMech (Hons), NER, CPEng, Technical Director, Holmes Fire, kindly prepared the content of this note.

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Related courses - Available via Online CPD

• NCC 2022 Update 01: Fire safety