{"id":46086,"date":"2018-08-30T12:29:48","date_gmt":"2018-08-30T11:29:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/?p=46086"},"modified":"2018-08-30T12:29:48","modified_gmt":"2018-08-30T11:29:48","slug":"gsa-flammable-insulation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/","title":{"rendered":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art’s<\/a> Mackintosh Building, which was gutted by a blaze earlier this year<\/h2>\n

The 110-year-old building, including its internationally renowned library, was being restored after a devastating fire in April 2014. The project was being handled by architect Park\/Page and contractor Kier<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The school’s director, Tom Inns, had previously said Kier’s assurances that an adequate fire safety strategy was in place had been “professionally checked”.<\/p>\n

The investigation into the cause of June’s fire is ongoing but a number of experts have questioned the decision to use Polyisocyanurate\u00a0(PIR) insulation, which comprises an insulation core sandwiched between aluminium foil facings, in a studio above the original library.<\/p>\n

Geoff Wilkinson, managing director of Wilkinson Construction Consultants<\/a>, told PBC Today that while PIR complies with the Building Regulations<\/a>, it is “particularly concerning” that an alternative product wasn’t specified given the building’s historic nature and past fire safety issues.<\/p>\n

“The likely driver would have been to improve the thermal performance of the building, which is a laudable aim, and, per millimetre of thickness, PIR is one of the best performing insulation products,” he said.<\/p>\n

“However, it wouldn’t have been a dramatic reduction in performance to have used a non-combustible product or a product that at least had more limited flame propagation properties.<\/p>\n

“Given all of that, you would have expected a fully responsible design team, considering the past history, to have specified a different product \u2013 even though PIR meets the minimum standard of the Building Regulations.”<\/p>\n

Wilkinson added that under the Construction (Design & Management) Regulations 2015<\/a>, there is a “wider remit” to minimise all known risks to acceptable levels.<\/p>\n

“Regardless of whether the insulation complied with Building Regs or not, when you know there’s a particular risk or a past history with the building, all of that should be factored in as part of the CDM risk assessment \u2013 and that should be carried out for literally every material and piece of work that you do,” he said.<\/p>\n

“So rather than the focus being on the Building Regs, it should have been down the fire risk assessment and the CDM assessment to ensure that you minimise the fire risk within that building.”<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the Glasgow School of Art<\/a> said: “The GSA\u2019s restoration plans went through Glasgow City Council’s thorough planning and historic building permission process, and were authorised through the issue of a Building Warrant.<\/p>\n

“The Mackintosh Building was being restored using a combination of historic materials and craftsmanship.<\/p>\n

“Any contemporary materials used in the restoration not only complied fully with\u00a0the appropriate British and European Standard Institution\u00a0specifications,\u00a0but were also aligned with guidelines from specialist agencies such as Historic Environment Scotland and Historic England.”<\/p>\n

PBC Today has approached Park\/Page<\/a> for comment.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art’s Mackintosh Building, which was gutted by a blaze earlier this year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[306],"tags":[568,676,110,586,472],"stakeholder_rel_tag":[],"contributor_rel_tag":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-46086","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-building-control-news","7":"tag-building-regulations","8":"tag-construction","9":"tag-fire-safety-management","10":"tag-insulation","11":"tag-kier"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Planning, Building & Construction Today\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/PBCToday\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/GSA-restoration-criticised-for-using-flammable-insulation-following-2014-fire.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"623\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Steph Blundell\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@https:\/\/twitter.com\/Steph_PBCToday\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@PBC_Today\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Steph Blundell\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/baf6766a43e70a35cada0c600519a2fb\"},\"headline\":\"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\"},\"wordCount\":488,\"commentCount\":1,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Building Regulations\",\"Construction Processes\",\"Fire Safety Management\",\"Insulation\",\"Kier\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Building Control News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#respond\"]}],\"copyrightYear\":\"2018\",\"copyrightHolder\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\",\"name\":\"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00\",\"description\":\"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/\",\"name\":\"Planning, Building & Construction Today\",\"description\":\"The Latest Planning, Building & Construction News\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Planning, Building & Construction Today\",\"alternateName\":\"PBC Today\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/pbctoday-logo-yoast-seo-organisation-1920-1080-001.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/pbctoday-logo-yoast-seo-organisation-1920-1080-001.jpg\",\"width\":1920,\"height\":1080,\"caption\":\"Planning, Building & Construction Today\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/PBCToday\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/PBC_Today\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/baf6766a43e70a35cada0c600519a2fb\",\"name\":\"Steph Blundell\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/62283f53e7b9ae55cd3516832342b97ce87c86f2c2130dfce68124d194b36df8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/62283f53e7b9ae55cd3516832342b97ce87c86f2c2130dfce68124d194b36df8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Steph Blundell\"},\"description\":\"Steph is the Senior Digital Editor here at PBC. When she\u2019s not working hard on cranking out first-class content for our online viewers to enjoy, she\u2019s keeping our social media lively and up to date\u2026 you could call her a social media guru? We\u2019re sure she\u2019d like that. With a BA in English and Journalism, Steph isn\u2019t fazed by attention to detail; on the contrary, she enjoys getting her teeth into a good article. In her downtime Steph loves nothing more than getting together with friends to enjoy a few (several) gin and tonics. Think you\u2019ve got some content Steph would be interested in? You can contact her either by phone on (01270) 502876 or by email at sblundell@pbctoday.co.uk\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/steph-blundell\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/https:\/\/twitter.com\/Steph_PBCToday\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/author\/stephblundell\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire","description":"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire","og_description":"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building","og_url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/","og_site_name":"Planning, Building & Construction Today","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/PBCToday\/","article_published_time":"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00","og_image":[{"width":623,"height":480,"url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/GSA-restoration-criticised-for-using-flammable-insulation-following-2014-fire.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Steph Blundell","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@https:\/\/twitter.com\/Steph_PBCToday","twitter_site":"@PBC_Today","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/"},"author":{"name":"Steph Blundell","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/baf6766a43e70a35cada0c600519a2fb"},"headline":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire","datePublished":"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/"},"wordCount":488,"commentCount":1,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization"},"keywords":["Building Regulations","Construction Processes","Fire Safety Management","Insulation","Kier"],"articleSection":["Building Control News"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#respond"]}],"copyrightYear":"2018","copyrightHolder":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization"}},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/","url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/","name":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2018-08-30T11:29:48+00:00","description":"Fire safety experts have criticised the decision to use flammable insulation in the \u00a351m restoration of Glasgow School of Art's Mackintosh Building","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/building-control-news\/gsa-flammable-insulation\/46086\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"GSA restoration criticised for using flammable insulation following 2014 fire"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/","name":"Planning, Building & Construction Today","description":"The Latest Planning, Building & Construction News","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#organization","name":"Planning, Building & Construction Today","alternateName":"PBC Today","url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/pbctoday-logo-yoast-seo-organisation-1920-1080-001.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/pbctoday-logo-yoast-seo-organisation-1920-1080-001.jpg","width":1920,"height":1080,"caption":"Planning, Building & Construction Today"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/PBCToday\/","https:\/\/x.com\/PBC_Today"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/baf6766a43e70a35cada0c600519a2fb","name":"Steph Blundell","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/62283f53e7b9ae55cd3516832342b97ce87c86f2c2130dfce68124d194b36df8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/62283f53e7b9ae55cd3516832342b97ce87c86f2c2130dfce68124d194b36df8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Steph Blundell"},"description":"Steph is the Senior Digital Editor here at PBC. When she\u2019s not working hard on cranking out first-class content for our online viewers to enjoy, she\u2019s keeping our social media lively and up to date\u2026 you could call her a social media guru? We\u2019re sure she\u2019d like that. With a BA in English and Journalism, Steph isn\u2019t fazed by attention to detail; on the contrary, she enjoys getting her teeth into a good article. In her downtime Steph loves nothing more than getting together with friends to enjoy a few (several) gin and tonics. Think you\u2019ve got some content Steph would be interested in? You can contact her either by phone on (01270) 502876 or by email at sblundell@pbctoday.co.uk","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/steph-blundell\/","https:\/\/x.com\/https:\/\/twitter.com\/Steph_PBCToday"],"url":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/author\/stephblundell\/"}]}},"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-10-05 06:15:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46086","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46086"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46086\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46086"},{"taxonomy":"stakeholder_rel_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/stakeholder_rel_tag?post=46086"},{"taxonomy":"contributor_rel_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pbctoday.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor_rel_tag?post=46086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}