Safety issues

Since the construction of the buildings after the Second World war, the expectations of society have altered with regard to risk tolerance, and as with any new technology, the energy generation, energy storage and thermal management systems may bring novel risks that will have to be managed.  The safety assurance element of the Northern Homes project will consider the control of the relevant risks from the broadest perspective, not only in terms of the stakeholders exposed to the risks, such as owner /occupiers, members of the general public and emergency responders; but also the methods applied in the process of risk management itself.  In addition to proposals to mitigate engineering risks, these may include aspects of education, training, and legislation.     

To meet appropriate standards, it is hoped to utilise remote imagery of Northern Norway to compliment other techniques in the creation of a safety assurance justification.  Remote sensing imagery would prime a comprehensive map of the Northern Homes properties, identifying their orientation relative to anticipated future wind directions, separation from adjacent structures and the potential combustibility of surface material on the surrounding terrain.  The product of this analysis would have a number of components.  First, a catalogue of properties by risk level for local fire services, to assist in the planning of fire prevention and response.  Second, data to inform firefighter training.  In addition, the information would be used in the planning of new infrastructure such as large battery and other energy storage facilities.  This would identify minimum safe distances to ensure that in the case of fire the incident heat flux on surrounding structures – particularly the wooden buildings that are the focus of this project – remains lower than the 12,6 kW/m2 value adopted in many building codes.