Fire-safety aspects of long-span timber structures in industrial buildings

This paper investigates the possibilities and challenges in relation to fire-safety for using timber as a structural material in industrial buildings. Combining a literature study with interviews with fire-safety specialists, it goes through historic and fire-safety aspects of industrial buildings, as well as the intrinsic fire properties of virgin and reused timber. The findings show that the prerequisites to a high extent have changed for this building typology, making it often more suitable and safer to apply timber structures than prior to the 20^th century where industrial buildings had significant fire issues. The choice between virgin and reused timber is not without importance though: conventional timber components with large cross sections have some beneficial and predictable intrinsic properties in relation to fire where reused timber components, with more complex compositions, can be less predictable and would therefore depend highly on different fire-protection systems, such as sprinkling and/or coverings.