Siemens upgrades fire safety at Islington Waste Recycling Centre

Islington Waste Recycling Centre is operated by Islington Council and one of seven refuse and recycling sites in North London, which collectively manage 820,000 tonnes of waste and recycling each year.

Such facilities present their own specific challenges when it comes to effective fire detection, with the scale of the problem illustrated by what are referred to as 300 ‘significant fires’ at such premises throughout the UK being attended by the Fire and Rescue Services on an annual basis.

Waste sites process mixed recyclable waste which is collected, sorted, stockpiled and processed. Plastics, paper, cardboard, wood and rubber are the typical materials involved. Such materials are highly combustible and susceptible to potential ignition from the processing machinery through which they’re handled.

Significant upgrade

The Islington Waste Recycling Centre played host to an existing fire detection system that had been in situ for 20 years. A significant upgrade was required to meet the new challenges of waste management, including the proliferation of disposable vapes and the threat of lithium-ion battery fires: one of the more recent additions to the fire risk landscape.

TP Fire and Security is a long-standing provider of fire detection and alarm services for  Islington Council. From its three offices in Norfolk, Essex and the Midlands, the company offers a nationwide service for the design, installation and maintenance of fire safety systems.

This business has been part of the Siemens Approved Partner Programme for the last year, having identified the opportunity to work with Siemens when Tom Warner joined the business as a fire safety engineer. Warner had previous experience of partnering with Siemens and, when this project materialised, he recognised the potential for employing the Cerberus PRO system.

One of the challenges at the waste site was the inevitable dusty environment. Advanced signal analysis (ASA) detectors from Siemens match the conditions of a particular site through their application-specific ASA parameter function. This allows the detectors to distinguish between a real fire and deceptive phenomena such as dust, thereby providing immunity from false alarms.

Open and operational

Kevin Harris (technical design manager at TP Fire and Security) commented: “The Cerberus PRO system is perfect for this project, with the detectors’ particular capability to operate in such a dusty environment. The project went very well, taking some seven days to complete, all while the waste facility was open and operational.”

Three Cerberus PRO panels are operating across the site, interfacing with Siemens ASA detectors and Call Points through the existing compliant cabling. In total, 69 ASA detectors are located in the basement, 38 on the ground floor, 52 on the first and second floors (including the plant room), 74 in the tipping hall and 42 in the offices.

Siemens worked closely with TP Fire and Security to develop a comprehensive solution for meeting all fire safety regulations and standards. The Cerberus PRO system provides quick and reliable protection in the small window that exists to react and prevent a small fire from becoming a potentially major incident in such a harsh and hazardous environment.

*Additional detail on Siemens Smart Infrastructure (Buildings) can be accessed at www.siemens.co.uk/cerberus

**Further information concerning Siemens Smart Infrastructure is available online at www.siemens.com/smart-infrastructure