IS YOUR BUILDING SAFE? FIND OUT WITH A CLADDING AUDIT FROM FAHRENHEIT GLOBAL

Invest in the safety of your building with a cladding audit.

At Fahrenheit Global, we understand the considerable risks associated with certain types of external wall cladding. If your building has not been audited with a specific focus on cladding, you may have a fire safety hazard of which you are not aware. Our cladding audit services will help you determine whether you should be concerned.

Common Mistakes Building Owners Make Regarding Cladding Audits

The top risks associated with exterior building cladding and cladding-related audits include:

• Not understanding the risks: In June 2017, a fire at the Grenfell Tower in West London claimed 72 lives and caused 70 additional injuries. The fire spread rapidly and burned for 60 hours, mainly due to the presence of combustible aluminium cladding and insulation on the sides of the building. Many other buildings have similarly combustible cladding and are tragedies waiting to happen.
• Assuming cladding isn’t a problem: Don’t assume your building isn’t cladded with ACPs (aluminium composite panels) or other flammable materials. Many modern buildings were designed with aesthetics in mind but not necessarily for fire safety. Unless you have had your building audited, it may have this common fire hazard.
• Failing to comply with legal requirements: Did you know that New South Wales has instituted laws to ban the use of unsafe external wall cladding? Building owners have a responsibility to check their cladding, assess building fire safety, and take steps to resolve fire hazards. 

At Fahrenheit Global, our thorough audits can help you determine whether your exterior cladding is flammable. If it is, we will provide advice for next steps.

 
Tips Regarding Combustible Cladding

If you aren’t sure whether your building has flammable exterior cladding components, follow these tips to stay compliant and safe:

• See if you can find out what type of cladding was used: If you aren’t sure whether the cladding on your building is combustible, ask the builder, property manager, strata manager or previous owner if they know. These details should be included in the design and construction documents.
• Update your fire safety statement: Your building should have a fire safety audit annually, and the statement from this audit should be displayed prominently somewhere in your building. If the statement isn’t up to date, take steps to correct this issue.
• Schedule a cladding audit: Unless you can find written evidence that your exterior cladding is not made from ACPs or other combustible materials, hire an auditing firm to determine the answer for you. We will act to identify the type of cladding on your building, confirm its fire rating and recommend next steps (if there is a fire safety concern).
  
  

Why a Cladding Audit Is Cost Effective

Cladding audits are a small investment to prevent massive cost, legal liability, PR disaster and potential loss of life. If you aren’t sure whether the cladding on your building is safe, paying a small amount of money for a thorough audit is a must to protect your asset, your tenants and the general public alike. Contact Fahrenheit Global today to get the answers you are seeking.