Sprinklers give fire at The Minister no chance

In Rijswijk, on the site of the former Winston Churchill Tower, construction is in full swing on The Minister; an 85-meter-high residential tower with 310 apartments that will enrich the city's skyline. Commissioned by the building consortium The Minister (Kondor Wessels Amsterdam and Kroon & De Koning), Unica Fire Safety and Boele Fire Protection are providing the complete sprinkler installation, including sprinklers, pump sets and battery system, so that an unexpected fire can be fought quickly and effectively. 

"Because of the height of the building, a water mist or sprinkler system was mandatory," says Henk Jan Kooijmans, Senior Account Manager at Unica Fire Safety. "Together with consultant LBP|SIGHT and inspection body Normec, we mapped the possibilities and fire safety risks of this specific project, based on which a sprinkler solution was chosen. This is also prescribed in the starting point document (UPD) fire safety, which describes which structural, installation technical and organizational measures ensure a sufficiently fire-safe building."

Precise extinguishing per 12 m2

The Minister will have its own water reservoir with a capacity of 180 m3. "Two redundant pump sets will ensure the supply of sufficient extinguishing water from the water reservoir to the sprinklers," Kooijmans says: "There will be risers in the shafts and branch lines with signaling devices on the floors. A large number of sprinkler heads with a heat-sensitive element will also be installed. As a result, the sprinklers are activated only when the immediate ambient temperature reaches a certain value (in this case 68°C). Thanks to the sprinkler system, we can extinguish incipient fires to the nearest 12 m2."

Clean alternative

The sprinkler pump sets are supplied by Boele Fire Protection, which has been part of the Unica Fire Safety cluster since 2018. "Unica Fire Safety calculated exactly how many m3/h of water at how much bar the sprinkler pump sets should be able to deliver in the event of a fire. Based on this, we selected the right sets," says Peter Boele, Business Development Manager at Boele Fire Protection. "Because the pump sets will be redundant - and thus must have their own power supply - an emergency power generator would initially be placed next to the building. Because an emergency power generator makes quite a lot of noise, emits soot and consumes diesel to produce energy, we jointly proposed a clean alternative: the Battery Power Supply (BPS). This BPS is built in a dedicated room near the pump room, so short cables are sufficient. Also, no heavy electrical infrastructure is needed at the front."

The BPS has an installation cabinet with permanently filled lead-acid batteries. "The amount of energy in these batteries is more than enough to run a ten-minute test every two weeks," Boele said. "But also to put out an incipient fire immediately afterwards in the event of an emergency, for sixty minutes and at the most unfavorable location in the building." To optimize battery life and performance, the ambient temperature in the BPS room is kept constant at 20°C, Kooijmans says. "In addition, sprinkler protection will be installed to ensure safety here as well. Thanks to solar panels on the roof of the parking garage, we can fill the battery pack with renewable energy."