Print this pageDesigning cold storage facilities with active fire protection
Designing an active fire protection system for a refrigerated storage facility or a freezer is a challenge for fire protection engineers. The extreme cold limits the devices that will work and maintenance and testing also have to be considered.
With the contents of a cold storage facility frequently being perishable and often worth more than the building itself, cold store operators and their insurers are keen to avoid the business disruption and asset losses associated with large or small fires.
And there's not just the refrigerated area to consider. Loading bays, plant and maintenance rooms are also difficult to protect from fire.
An engineer designing a fire protection system for a cold storage facility has to consider what will work, and continue to work in all areas of the building. They also have to consider how to provide the earliest possible warning of a fire so that stock damage can be prevented.
The solution? A VESDA air sampling smoke detection system.
A VESDA detector (indicated by red arrow in picture) is installed outside the low-temperature area, in a control room or maintenance area. Only the sample pipe is installed in the cold room.
A VESDA system offers the following advantages in Cold Stores:
- The VESDA detector can be positioned outside of the refrigerated area. This ensures it is unaffected by the internal sub-zero temperatures and is easy to maintain. Only the air sampling pipe network is inside the cold store where it actively collects air samples that are returned to the detector.
- The filtration system and advanced learning capabilities of the VESDA detectors eliminates nuisance alarms due to condensation clouds
- A VESDA system can be designed to specifically suit a facility’s individual layout of freezers, chillers, coolers and loading bays, ceiling void space, plant/maintenance areas and facility monitoring areas. This ensures very early warning no matter where the fire starts.
- VESDA smoke detectors have been approved for use in refrigerated storage facilities by FM Global, a major commerical property insurance and risk management company. The approval includes the use of VESDA detectors to activate suppression systems.
Learn more
VESDA air sampling smoke detection in Cold Stores
This brochure provides an overview of the VESDA smoke detection solution for Refrigerated Storage and Cold Storage facilities.
Design guide for VESDA in Refrigerated Storage and Cold Store facilities
This "How to" guide provides engineers and designers with the specifics of designing a VESDA system for a cold store. You will need an access level other than 'Reg' to access this file. more
On-demand webinar - Protecting Cold Stores
This recorded presentation discusses how to design a VESDA system for a cold store or freezer.
How Vesda works
View this short animation (Quicktime movie) showing how a VESDA smoke detection system works.
Very early warning smoke detection
Learn how VESDA provides the earliest possible warning of a fire by viewing this short animation (Quicktime movie).
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