Safety management of building materials will be further strengthened to ease worries about building fires. The government plans to reduce unnecessary procedural burdens on corporations while raising fire safety standards for items such as fire shutters and managing the entire manufacturing and installation process more closely to substantially improve public safety.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said on the 19th it will approve on the 20th a revision to the Detailed Operational Guidelines for Quality Certification and Management of Building Materials, which includes excluding performance tests when factories are relocated or equipment is replaced and creating a new quality certification category for fire shutters.
The building material quality certification system presents clear performance standards for building materials where fire safety is crucial and manages them to ensure they are manufactured and installed in line with those standards. The Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology (KICT), designated as the quality certification body, issues quality certificates and inspects manufacturing plants and construction sites for five key building materials important to building fire safety: fire-resistive structures, fire doors, automatic fire shutters, firestop systems, and composite materials (sandwich panels).
Under this revision, unreasonable regulations that inconvenience corporations will be rationally improved. Until now, corporations producing quality-certified building materials had to conduct performance tests to receive quality certificates for their products, and after certification, they had to retest each certified product whenever production conditions changed to reconfirm fire safety. However, performance testing requires time and expense, imposing a significant burden on manufacturing corporations, and there had been opinions that requiring tests even for simple factory relocations or replacement with better equipment amounted to excessive procedural regulation.
Accordingly, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) will improve the system so that when a factory is relocated or equipment is replaced with equal or better performance, safety can be verified through document review and on-site factory confirmation instead of performance testing.
Expertise in building material safety management will also be strengthened. Currently, for quality-certified materials found problematic through inspections of manufacturing plants and construction sites, the operating committee deliberates and decides whether to impose sanctions such as canceling quality certification. However, when the operating committee makes decisions, small and midsize corporations often lack the personnel needed to handle professional procedures such as hearings and document submissions. Accordingly, if the corporation wishes, MOLIT will allow associations to submit expert opinions to the operating committee and to attend construction site inspections to supplement expertise.
A composite fire shutter category will also be newly established. By introducing the composite fire shutter, which recognizes a fire door and an automatic fire shutter as a single product, authorities have addressed the shortcomings of the previous integrated fire shutter and set new standards to enhance safety.
MOLIT also included measures to improve system operation by specifying the list of documents to be submitted when applying for certification so corporations can clearly understand the content and procedures and minimize difficulties during the quality certification process. In addition, when a construction contractor, rather than a manufacturing corporation, applies for quality certification, the revision specifically lists the additional documents to be submitted. It also clearly defines sampling standards, such as the size and location for sample collection during quality inspections, to minimize inconvenience for companies obtaining quality certification.
In addition, MOLIT is pushing to introduce an integrated building material management platform that uses information technology (IT) so manufacturers, distributors, and builders can easily record histories and check them in real time through pattern information (QR codes) and an app for effective building material management.
Jeong Seung-su, head of the Building Safety Division at MOLIT, said, "Through this revision to the detailed operational guidelines, we will continue to improve the fire safety of building materials while boldly addressing procedural inconveniences and challenges faced by corporations in the field," adding, "We will continue to listen to voices from the field through industry meetings and make improvements."