Exova Warringtonfire opened a new fire safety excellence facility earlier this month, expanding its testing space by more than 4,000 square metres
The facility in Warrington, Cheshire, will allow Exova to increase the amount of concrete and steel coating tests it is able to undertake as well as offering customers increased levels of confidentiality when testing their new products. The new facilities are designed to also increase the speed with which manufacturers are able to get their products approved and compliant to all the relevant standards.
UK Fire Minister Brandon Lewis welcomed the investment into the new facility, saying that it underlines that the economy is on the road to growth. He observed:
It is encouraging to see a global business such as Exova committing investment to the highly skilled services for which the UK is known and which increasingly put us at the forefront of advancing fire safety worldwide.
The testing facility now employs more than 100 of Exova Warringtonfire’s 225 staff, making it among the largest testing facilities the firm operates. With the increased space it will also be able to test industrial and commercial watermist systems.
The new investment follows other huge new facilities opened around the world this year. In March, the company unveiled a state-of-the-art fire resistance furnace at a cost of AUS$1.6 million in its testing facility in Melbourne, Australia.
The company has also invested in facade fire testing frames in Dubai — a city that has suffered from a spate of high-rise fires exacerbated by flammable cladding.
Exova CEO Ian El-Mokadem said:
Our commitment is to help our customers gain faster, more efficient market entry wherever they are in the world.
In Warrington, we have some of the very best talent in fire testing and this investment will ensure they can better support customers with advice and testing solutions to meet the most rigorous of regulatory or voluntary requirements.
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It is interesting to know that we are still investing in Fire safety equipments and developing fire resilient products through this testing infrastructure and yet still we are cutting off the number of fire men and women. Is this the way forward for our future fire safety mechanisms?
The new facilities are designed to also increase the speed with which manufacturers are able to get their products approved and compliant to all the relevant standards.
@Robert Brown, thanks for the post. This is good news. Faster product approval means end users will have more products to choose from. Am sure manufacturers will take advantage of this new facility to innovate and develop new products.
It is interesting to know that we are still investing in Fire safety equipments and developing fire resilient products through this testing infrastructure and yet still we are cutting off the number of fire men and women.
@George Brown, I think investment in fire safety equipments and development of fire resilient products will continue and this will eventually help us improve the fire safety because end users will have more variety of products to choose from.
@Sunita T I think it is necessary to keep improving and have products which will effectively discover early signs of fire outbreak and to have equipments which can improve our fire safety needs
as technology changing – materials changing too… and the process of improving/updating never ending process… firesafety…
could not agree more, this type of investment, not only improve firesafety but will save lives… of the fireman and the public as variety of products gives more choices and affordability to the public…
I agree 100% because the purpose of these trials is to prevent and reduce unforeseeable fire outbreak and to improve fire safety equipments/products
agree, but the process should never stops… as manf. technology changes and new materials have it own set of problems… including fire safety…
I agree and I think we will continue to improve and seek more effective ways of doing things and embrace valuable changes as one of lead developed countries in fire safety preventions in the world
yes, but like with everything else testing and re-testing need to be done… as let say – plastic…. small changes in the productions to make plastic lighter and stronger could increase/make it more flamable… and in the productions you never get the same batch of plastic pelets twice…. always small degree of variations…
True. We need to keep testing and investing in fire safety equipments at all times to have robust fire equipments which will support changing demands in our economic and worldwide.