{"id":1331,"date":"2010-04-19T15:48:40","date_gmt":"2010-04-19T20:48:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ulprospector.com\/knowledge\/?p=1331"},"modified":"2018-02-09T14:01:03","modified_gmt":"2018-02-09T20:01:03","slug":"pe-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ulprospector.ul.com\/1331\/pe-fire\/","title":{"rendered":"Fire Hazard Testing – TC89"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Nicolas Maennling<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Fire!<\/strong>\u00a0 The very word conjures up chaos of the worst kind. Thankfully, fire in electrotechnical equipment is relatively rare due partly to the ongoing efforts of TC\u00a089 Fire hazard testing<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Fire Fire safety is a concern in every geographical region, and TC\u00a089 seeks to establish global methods and guidance for assessing fire hazard in electrotechnical products. There is a rapid global increase in the use of electrotechnical products in all application areas.<\/p>\n

In the developed world, fire claims 10 – 20 people per million of population per annum, and fire losses amount to approximately 0.2\u00a0% of gross domestic product per year. Occupied buildings account for a majority of fatal fires. In addition, uncontrolled fires, and their effluent, are perceived as a significant environmental concern.<\/p>\n

Electrotechnical products present two potential hazards: they contain or convey electrical energy and, therefore, may be a source of ignition and an avenue of fire spread.<\/p>\n

TC\u00a089 aims to establish a basis for assessing fire hazard which facilitates an objective evaluation and trade-off between adequate safety and minimum overall cost.<\/p>\n

Any reduction in the incidence of uncontrolled fire can only be regarded as having a positive environmental benefit on the risk to health, post fire contamination and clean-up, and long term environmental effects.<\/p>\n

Philosophy <\/strong>
\nThe risk of fire needs to be considered in any electrical circuit. The primary aim is to prevent ignition due to the electrically energized part but, if ignition and fire do occur, to control the fire preferably within the bounds of the enclosure of the electrotechnical product.<\/p>\n

The best method for testing electrotechnical products with regard to fire hazard is to duplicate exactly the conditions occurring in practice. In most instances this is not possible. Accordingly, for practical reasons, the testing of electrotechnical products with regard to fire hazard is best conducted by simulating as closely as possible the actual effects occurring in practice.<\/p>\n

History<\/strong>
\nTC\u00a089 was formed in 1988 by the decision of the Council of IEC to change former Subcommittee\u00a050D into a full technical committee for all matters related to fire.<\/p>\n

Canada is responsible for the secretariat and the chairman, Uberto Vercellotti, is from Italy.<\/p>\n

Status<\/strong>
\nTC\u00a089 is a horizontal committee with a safety pilot function within the IEC to give guidance and develop standards related to fire hazards for use by other IEC Committees. TC\u00a089 is assigned to write basic safety publications.<\/p>\n

The scope of TC\u00a089 is to prepare international standards, technical specifications and technical reports in the areas of:<\/p>\n