On October 16, 2023, the Ministry of Construction issued Circular No. 09/2023/TT-BXD ("Circular 09") on Amendments 1:2023 QCVN 06:2022/BXD ("Regulation 06") national technical regulations on fire safety for houses and buildings. The amended Regulation 06 introduces many new regulations, including the following key points:
1. Supplementing and clarifying subjects of application of fire safety regulations to houses
a. For individual houses, individual houses with a combination of other uses and individual houses converted to other uses
Accordingly, Circular 09 changes the criteria for determining individual houses applicable under Regulation 06. Specifically, individual houses must meet one of the following criteria:
- Height of 7 floors or more (or fire protection height of 25m or more); or
- Have a volume of 5000m3 or more; or
- Have more than 1 basement to 3 basements.
In case an individual house does not meet one of the above criteria, the fire safety requirements stated in the standards on individual houses and other standard documents may be applied to fire safety design.
b. For houses not covered by the applicable criteria of Regulation 06: May be considered for application if the requirements in this Regulation are suitable for that type of house.
c. For free-standing houses:
Suppose an independent building cannot comply with the provisions of Regulation 06, based on the specific function of the house. In that case, standard documents can still be applied to fire safety design when the following conditions are simultaneously satisfied:
- Not F5[1] and individual houses.
- Has a height of less than 7 floors, a fire protection height of less than 25m and a volume of less than 5000m3.
2. Amending and supplementing a number of new definitions and principles of the Regulation
a. Adding how to determine the number of floors:
Accordingly, in addition to the tumble floor, the mezzanine floor (for F1[2], F2[3], F3[4], F4[5] houses) is also not counted in the number of floors of the building when used as a technical area and has a construction floor area not exceeding 10% of the floor area immediately below and not exceeding 300 m2 (only 01 mezzanine floor is not included in the number of floors).
b. Supplementing flexible regulations in the application of fire protection solutions:
Specifically, the revised Regulation allows the application of different fire protection solutions and plans (including solutions and plans not mentioned in this Regulation) to comply with the fire safety requirements of this Regulation, on the principle of ensuring the purpose of such requests.
c. Allow acceptance of construction errors within a certain scope:
Additional regulations clearly state that construction errors can be accepted when applying the size and distance regulations of Regulation 06 according to corresponding construction and acceptance standards. For the dimensions of width and height of emergency exits, door holes, corridors, stairs, elevators, escape routes and the like, the construction error is ± 5%.
3. Scope of application of fire safety regulations when renovating and repairing houses
In addition to new construction works and houses, the amended Regulation 06 may also apply to parts and areas directly renovated and repaired in the following cases:
- Renovate and repair changes in the function of floors, fire compartments or houses leading to improved fire safety requirements for floors, fire compartments and houses;
- Renovation or repair changes the escape solutions of the floor, fire compartment or house in the direction of reducing the number of emergency exits or stairs;
- Renovation or repair that increases the fire and explosion hazard class of the floor, fire compartment or house;
- Renovation and repair increase in scale, leading to improved fire safety requirements for floors, fire compartments and houses.
4. Adding new and tightening requirements on fire prevention and fighting to ensure the safety of people
- Compulsory nightclubs, discos, bars, singing rooms, karaoke businesses; and similar businesses must arrange an emergency exit on each floor or from one part of the floor separated from other parts of the floor by fire suppression elements;
- All basement floors must contain at least one entrance to the escape staircase chamber passing through a smoke hall separated from the surrounding space by a class 1 fire partition (previously defined as a class 2 fire partition) or equivalent solution.
- Motor vehicles must not be parked, Class A, B and C warehouses must not be located on floors with emergency exits outside the house, unless these areas are separated according to the provisions of Regulation 06;
- Karaoke and disco service businesses must separate corridors and rooms on the escape route by fire prevention elements such as glass walls or covers from non-combustible materials.
Circular 09 takes effect from December 1, 2023.
Notes:
- For construction design dossiers that have completed design approval for fire protection, before Circular 09 takes effect, continue to comply with the approved design dossiers.
- For construction design dossiers that have written comments on fire protection design at the basic design step but have not yet been approved for fire protection design, before Circular 09 takes effect, continue to appraise the design according to the written comments.
- For construction design dossiers that have not been commented on and approved for fire prevention and fighting since the effective date of Circular 09, the provisions of Regulation 06 and the amended Regulation 06 must be complied with
[1] Houses, buildings, rooms with production and warehouse functions.
[2] Houses for permanent or temporary accommodation (including for round-the-clock stays).
[3] Houses of cultural and sports facilities.
[4] Houses of commercial, business and residential service facilities.
[5] Educational and training works, working headquarters, scientific organizations, research and design, management agencies.
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