A global fire safety programme for one of the world's leading paint manufacturers.
Jotun Paints is a paint manufacturing company based in Norway, producing marine, protective, commercial and powder paints from factories spread around the globe. Each facility combines a range of building types - admin blocks, R&D laboratories, workshops, maintenance and utilities, finished goods and raw materials storage, open space areas and a tank farm - with the production buildings divided into water, solvent and powder types.
The facilities were constructed over the last 55 years, the oldest being Sandefjord in Norway, built in 1978. That site is remarkable: many of its areas are located inside a mountain, which also provided a refuge centre in the event of an atomic attack. Bringing a consistent, internationally recognised fire safety standard to a portfolio this varied and this widely dispersed was the purpose of the engagement.
Auditing fire safety across fifteen sites, then reviewing, testing and training.
Osborn Associates was asked to review the fire safety arrangements throughout fifteen paint manufacturing facilities. The audit covered three key elements - fire suppression systems, fire detection and alarm systems, and passive fire measures - each reviewed for its provision, condition, suitability and code compliance, as well as the maintenance of those systems and arrangements. The maintenance review considered not only code-compliant routines but the competency of the outsourced contractor, the thoroughness of the routines, the adequacy of the planned preventative maintenance management, and its interface with the roles undertaken by Jotun's own staff.
Each site survey was undertaken over a full week with the support of the local maintenance team and outsourced fire systems contractor, and included functional tests conducted with site management's permission. Jotun's group policy is to implement the various NFPA codes, so the reports highlighted instances of non-NFPA systems and, where possible, compared installed arrangements against local design codes - providing commentary on what was uncovered, with recommendations for remedial works as required. The facilities surveyed spanned Norway, the United Kingdom, Turkey, South Korea, the UAE, Indonesia, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Thailand, Vietnam, India and China.
Following the audit, Osborn Associates was asked to provide fire design reviews and site inspections for three further facilities in Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Abu Dhabi - reviewing the local contractors' design for fire protection, detection, passive fire safety, egress signage, emergency lighting and fire extinguishers, then carrying out monthly on-site progress surveys with snagging reports and witnessing testing and commissioning. The company was then asked to deliver live training for classrooms of site maintenance managers across three regions, and to create new Standard Operating Procedure templates for fire protection, detection and passive protection.
Bridging knowledge and language gaps across continents.
Working across so many countries brought its own challenges. In some instances the local site teams had little familiarity with NFPA standards, and language barriers occasionally caused misunderstandings. Osborn Associates was able to improve both through the use of clear examples, images and drawings - translating international standards into practical, site-level understanding regardless of the audience's starting point.
That emphasis on knowledge transfer became a defining feature of the relationship. Beyond the audits and design reviews, the live training and new SOP templates were designed to leave each site team more capable than before, and the local teams retain the freedom to contact Osborn Associates with questions and clarifications - an ongoing engagement, sustained through meetings and correspondence, aimed at achieving the safest possible outcome at every facility.
