New Zealand draft standards

NZS 4510:2008 sets out minimum technical and performance requirements for fire hydrants systems installed in buildings. Hydrant systems are primarily for fire service use when attending and dealing with fire emergencies in buildings.

The specific areas that this revision has addressed are as follows.

A. Comprehensive review of the requirements in line with operational firefighting needs.
• Review of the standard to reflect changes in the Building Code’s Compliance Documents which may impact on the safety of fire-fighters in their operations.
• Incorporation of the informative guidelines in Appendix C into the normative requirements of the standard.
• Review of construction requirements, including the need to partially commission the riser during the construction phase of a building project. Guidance is suggested to how risers should be progressively commissioned during the construction of a project.
• The ability to delete hydrants on the ground floor of a building is proposed to be amended. This will allow fire fighters to stage at the floor below any fire.
• The need to ensure that hydrants are located in areas where fire fighters can safely access them is reinforced.
• An informative appendix outlining key criteria that needs to be considered in designing hydrant systems where the normative requirements of the standard cannot be met, necessitating an alternative design approach.
• It is proposed to amend the pressure declared by the National Commander (PNC) to a pressure nominated by the standard downstream of the fire hydrant inlet check valve.
• The need to determine that a water supply is available to charge the hydrant system is proposed to be included in the standard’s requirements.
• Provisions for freeze protection of hydrant systems exposed to sub-zero temperatures are proposed.

B. Alignment with NZS 4541:2020 Automatic fire sprinkler systems
• Review of certain technical aspects of the standard to align with NZS4541:2020, including seismic design, pumps and combined sprinkler and riser systems.

We are now making the draft available for public comment for a period of 8 weeks. All comments submitted during this period are reviewed by the standards development committee before the standard is balloted on.

Note: The Committee and Standards New Zealand would appreciate if comments could be submitted before 28th July 2021.

You can submit comments via the Standards New Zealand website by using the 'submit comments' button. Alternatively you can submit public comments using the public comment form. Go to this link to download "https://www.standards.govt.nz/assets/PublicCommentForms/DZ4510-PC-Form.docx"

Please email the completed form to SNZPublicComments@mbie.govt.nz.