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Wildfire was barely recognised as a significant hazard in the UK prior to University of Manchester (UoM) research, that significantly changed stakeholders' and national policy-makers' awareness. This work on mapping and forecasting moorland wildfire risk has informed the Cabinet Office, and has demonstrated clear impact on fire preparedness planning in the Peak District National Park (where it is estimated that a large fire is potentially avoided each year). Following an ESRC-NERC seminar series (FIRES), the England and Wales Wildfire Forum (EWWF) was established, with EWWF persuading Government to further amend national policy on wildfire. This impact is ongoing, with DEFRA including wildfire in its `National Adaptation Programme', and the Cabinet Office recently including wildfire within the `National Risk Assessment' framework.
Enhanced public safety and transformation of structural design for fire has resulted from improved building design through ERPE researchers' development of new and unique design methodologies, frameworks and tools for analysing fire spread. Fire safety engineering research within ERPE has created an improved scientific understanding of the effect of fire on structures and materials. Structural and fire safety engineers across UK, EU, USA, Canada as well as those who are members of international fire safety bodies have subsequently implemented significant advances for the design of safer, more economical, sustainable, and architecturally innovative buildings.
ERPE research has thus assisted the design and construction of increasingly optimised, sustainable, and economical buildings globally with significant changes in building design and regulation, particularly during 2009-2013.
The use of fire retardants is a requirement to reduce fire severity and deaths but is also controversial due to environmental (leaching) and health consequences of commonly used halogenated fire retardants. A novel methodology has been developed and validated in the Fire Safety Engineering Research and Technology centre (FireSERT), Built Environment Research Institute, for the prediction of large-scale burning behaviour of fire retarded polymers by combining small-scale (mg size) experiments with computer simulations of fire growth and toxicity. The research has been instrumental for companies in redesigning their products (fire doors and intumescent coatings) and is informing the development of EU regulations regarding the use and replacement of halogenated fire retardants. The research output has been published in leading journals, cited widely internationally and referenced by key organisations.
Research at the University of Manchester on the risk and cost of wildfire has altered government policy, changed firefighting practice and help conserve a National Park. Aylen's advice to the Resilience & Emergencies Division of the Department for Communities & Local Government in 2012 ahead of a submission to the Cabinet Office helped build the case for inclusion of wildfire in the Government's National Risk Assessment. His confidential briefings drew extensively on his published research on the novel topic of forecasting and costing wildfire incidents in the UK and his unpublished work on the costs of the Swinley wildfire in 2011.
The Steady State Tube Furnace (ISO/FDIS 19700) allows fire toxicity to be quantified in real fire conditions. This has led to the introduction of "acidity classification" for cables in the European Construction Products Directive/Regulation (2008/2013) (as a surrogate for fire toxicity) to promote the use of safer, low smoke, zero halogen (LSZH) alternatives to PVC cables. Additionally, architects and building specifiers can use our data to avoid the most toxic foam insulation materials in low energy buildings. The biggest impact of our work, the global reduction in loss of life in fire is probably the most difficult to quantify, as too many other factors influence the fire statistics.
Our research provided the evidence to persuade companies to develop fire retardant formulations based on naturally occurring mixtures of hydromagnesite and huntite (HMH) that were more effective, cheaper, and greener than the market leader, aluminium hydroxide (ATH). Before the research started, in 2005, annual global sales of HMH as a fire retardant were less than [TEXT REMOVED FOR PUBLICATION] 000 tonnes. By 2012, sales had already doubled to [TEXT REMOVED FOR PUBLICATION] 000 tonnes (£[TEXT REMOVED FOR PUBLICATION] M) and continue to grow. LKAB minerals supply over 90% of the global market in HMH, and as a result of UCLan's fire retardant research, expect HMH to replace at least 25% of fine grade ATH within 5 years (increasing HMH sales to £[TEXT REMOVED FOR PUBLICATION] M). Not only is HMH a more effective fire retardant, it does not have the environmental problems associated with ATH.
Research undertaken in the Unit by Murphy et al. highlighted the benefits of a new people-centred approach to risk assessment supported by evidence-led performance management data for Fire and Rescue Services (FRS). The new Fire and Rescue National Framework for England published in July 2012 was subsequently based around these twin principles.
New frameworks for Scotland, Wales, N. Ireland and Eire published in 2012-13, followed England's lead and adopted this new approach. Similarly at the local level research by the same team has helped to shape the re-configuration of emergency cover provided by Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue Services (NFRS) based on the new approach.
Researchers at Brunel developed a new algorithm for the computation of residual risk in industrial explosion protection (IEP) installations in collaboration with Kidde Plc, which later became a part of UTC Fire and Security (UTCFS), a 57.7 billion USD company. This was the first algorithm clearly quantifying the safety integrity level versus cost trade-off in buying an IEP for the process plant owners. As the cost of such an installation varies from £40,000 to £700,000, quantifying this trade-off was a real unmet user need. A commercial implementation of this algorithm by a UK-based software vendor Optirisk Systems is now being used by the 31 strong sales force of UTCFS worldwide, as their main tool for negotiating the sales of IEP installations.
The Fire Safety Engineering Groups (FSEG's) research related to fire dynamics, fire modelling, human behaviour and evacuation modelling is saving lives because it is used to design safer aircraft, ships and buildings. Its Economic impact stems from licensing the SMARTFIRE and EXODUS software to over 300 organisations in 32 countries and commercial applications of the software which enable the realisation of cutting-edge designs and enabling the continual safe use of heritage structures such as the Statue of Liberty. Impact on Practitioners is a result of changes to international maritime guidelines based in FSEG research and the wide scale use of the SMARTFIRE and EXODUS software by engineers around the world. Society impact results from its research featuring in a number of popular documentary programmes attracting audiences measured in the millions.
Research by the The Fire Safety Engineering Group (FSEG) has encompassed fire dynamics, fire modelling, human behaviour and evacuation modelling, and this has been applied through software engineering research and development in the creation of state-of-the-art software packages in SMARTFIRE and EXODUS. This research is saving lives worldwide because it is used to design safer aircraft, ships and buildings, and this results in social, commercial, industrial and health impacts. Economic impact stems from licensing the SMARTFIRE and EXODUS software to over 300 organisations in 32 countries and commercial applications of the software which enable the realisation of cutting-edge designs and enabling the continual safe use of heritage structures such as the Statue of Liberty. Impact on Practitioners is a result of changes to international maritime guidelines arising from FSEG research, used to inform the development of the software tools, and the wide scale use of the SMARTFIRE and EXODUS software by engineers around the world. Society impact, over and above the design of safer environments, results from FSEG research featuring in a number of popular documentary programmes attracting audiences measured in the millions.