Building Safety

VERTEX’s team of engineers provides clients with building safety assessment services for acquisition, management, and disposition planning.

Process Safety Consulting

Our certified safety professionals have a goal of providing high-quality, cost-effective solutions that will increase the safety and reliability of a facility.

VERTEX Fire offers turn-key Process Safety solutions for every phase of a facility’s lifecycle.
Our Process Safety Consulting services include the following:

• SIL Determination
• Failure Modes and Effects Analysis
• Quantitative Risk Analysis
• PSM and RMP Compliance Audit/Program Support
• ALARP Assessments
• Human Factors Analysis
• Facility Siting Analysis
• Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA)
• Fire & Explosion Modeling
• Flame and Gas Detection Mapping
• Incident Investigation
• Process Hazard Analysis (PHA) Facilitation
• Offshore Safety Case Studies

Life Safety and Egress Analysis

Both new and existing buildings require a life safety and egress plan meeting the requirements set forth by applicable building codes. Existing buildings often require updated life safety and egress plans when undergoing a floor plan renovation, change of occupancy, or, in the instance of warehouses, updated plans are required when installing or revising rack storage.

Code Analysis

Life safety analysis and code analysis is completed in accordance with applicable building codes and includes a review of the following items and building conditions:

• Occupancy type
• Hazardous materials (if present)
• Building features such as:
  • Height
  • Number of stories
  • Area per floor
  • Construction type
  • Finishes
  • Fire protection systems present / planned
  • Occupant loads
• Egress and exiting options and features including:
  • Number of exits
  • Doorway, stairwell, and corridor widths
  • Dead ends
  • Common path of travel

Egress and Exiting Design

In addition to the code analysis, life safety and egress plans are prepared to visually indicate common paths of travel, dead ends, all exits, emergency exit lighting and signage, as well as identification of any specific requirements due to the building occupancy type, stored materials, or security features such as panic hardware. Our staff have prepared life safety and egress plans for warehouses, commercial facilities, warehouses, congested outdoor industrial facilities, and many other buildings and areas requiring adequate egress verification.

PFAS Foam Retrofit Consulting

For much of the history of industrial firefighting, aqueous film forming foams (AFFF) have been used to effectively suppress fires from flammable liquids stored in depth (also known as class B fires). Historically the surfactants that made these foams so effective were comprised of per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances, a.k.a. PFAS or the “forever chemicals”. Unfortunately, research in the last 15-20 years has shown that these substances accumulate in mammals and have been linked to a variety of negative health effects. In light of the issue, new foam compounds have been formulated to retrofit legacy fixed and portable firefighting systems, which by some estimates contribute approximately 5% of all PFAS environmental contamination.

VERTEX assists clients in these retrofit processes, which often require specialized fire protection design and application knowledge, because some alternate technologies like fluorine free foams (FFF) require higher application rates in suppression systems than traditional PFAS foam, often necessitating system retrofits and modification. At VERTEX, we work with each client’s individual situation to both educate them on the issue and to guide them in selecting the optimal solution for each PFAS foam retrofit based on their unique regulatory structure, risk tolerance, and budgetary constraints.

VERTEX has the unique insight of not only having designed many foam suppression systems in a wide variety of applications such as aircraft hangars, fuel terminals, and industrial plants, but also having participated in the latest cutting-edge fire testing of new fluorine free foam technologies that can serve as substitutes for legacy PFAS firefighting foams.

Engineered Life Safety Systems (ELSS)

Engineered life safety systems (ELSS) or Fire Safety Evaluation Systems (FSES) are alternate life safety concepts which are required to be developed by a registered professional engineer experienced in fire and life safety system design. State regulations vary. For example, in the state of Florida, ELSS or FSES are allowed by code to be provided in lieu of installing complete fire sprinkler systems in existing residential high-rise buildings. We understand the options for engineered life safety systems that meet compliance with Florida’s high-rise retrofit law being mandated in 2024. All ELSS or FSES alternatives must also be approved by the AHJ. VERTEX has developed ELSS/FSES systems for multiple residential high-rise condominiums throughout the state of Florida using the FSES method.

Fire Safety Evaluation System (FSES)

FSES systems are developed using a prescriptive scoring methodology and require a detailed evaluation of the existing building construction, hazards present within the building, and fire protection systems installed among other variables. Additionally, these systems may include any or all of the following:

• Partial automatic sprinkler protection
• Smoke detection systems
• Smoke control systems
• Compartmentation
• Other approved systems

Investigational Inspection and Testing Services

VERTEX provides investigational inspection and testing services for clients experiencing failures or repeated activations and trouble alarms for their existing systems. The inspection and testing services provided by VERTEX are not to be confused with code required inspection, testing and maintenance services which are to be provided by licensed contractors.

When a system is experiencing constant troubles, alarms, or activations, there is often an underlying problem such as faulty or damaged equipment and sometimes the fault lies in the original system design or installation. Our engineering staff have performed many inspection and testing visits to evaluate existing systems to determine the cause of alarms or failures. Some of the more typical causes of such incidents have been found to include:

• Repeated fire alarm system activations from non-weatherproof exterior devices leading to water intrusion and corrosion causing system trouble signals
• Nuisance flame detector activation due to inadequate detector positioning allowing the sun to enter the field of view and cause a false activation
• Repeated leaks in fire sprinkler systems due to microbially induced corrosion (MIC) or other corrosive issues
• Leaks from damaged dry-pipe system piping due to inadequate pipe slope allowing water to pool and corrode piping internally

In addition to these more common causes, we have identified other less frequent discrepancies and defects in existing client systems. The goal of each inspection and testing visit is to determine the underlying cause of incidents and provide the optimal solution. Simple causes can sometimes be fixed during the inspection and testing, while others require system modification or replacement.

Systems Commissioning and Startup Services

VERTEX’s engineering staff are familiar not only with the design of systems but also with the commissioning and startup procedures associated with each system type. Our staff have provided commissioning and startup services for a variety of fire protection systems including: