Fire Safety and Security

Buildings face the greatest risk from fires during the construction phase. In recent years, there have been several examples across Canada of major construction site fires, including those in Calgary, Alberta in March 2015, Kingston, Ontario in December 2013 and Richmond, British Columbia in 2011.

Construction sites present fire departments with a different set of challenges from those associated with completed buildings. The construction stage is the most dangerous point in any building’s lifespan due to a number of risks, which are outlined in this report along with fire prevention and suppression response. Research in 2014 demonstrated that wood buildings are as safe as those built with steel and concrete when effective fire-safety systems are in place. However, like all buildings, wood buildings are more vulnerable to fires when they lack those systems – as is the case during construction. The introduction of taller wood buildings increases both the complexity of fire protection at construction sites, and the potential for fire loss or for fire loss.

Recently, Vancouver architect Michael Green issued a report entitled Tall Wood, arguing that skyscrapers and other tall buildings should use more wood as a primary construction material. His argument is that wood is up to the task, is less polluting, and is more environmentally sustainable than the materials currently used. Green’s (2012) buildings would employ “massive timber” elements such as cross-laminated timber, laminated strand lumber, and laminated veneer lumber. Green is not suggesting that these tall building be of wood only. Rather, he is arguing that mass timber be integrated with other commonly-used structural materials such as concrete and steel.

The construction of mass timber buildings is garnering significant interest throughout the Canadian building industry. While building with mass timber has existed for many years in many European countries, the move towards the use of mass timber for larger and taller buildings in Canada is based on the growing popularity of engineered wood products such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glue-laminated timber (glulam). Some of the benefits of using these relatively new construction materials include design aesthetics and positive environmental impacts. These materials also lend themselves well to prefabrication and may drastically reduce construction time and costs.

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Heavy timber construction has a long history of use in buildings up to and including 8-storey buildings still in use in both Vancouver and Toronto. Although heavy timber has been the preferred material for construction of large buildings at the turn of the last century, it fell out of use in the middle of the last century due to building codes that were introduced to the country with strict requirements for combustible construction. However, there is now a renewed interest for wood in large buildings due to the material’s benefits to the environment, ease of workmanship, and the warm and inviting aesthetics.

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