Webinar Recap: Protecting Chemical Distribution Facilities: Rolling Door Requirements for Energy, Fire and Life Safety, and Security Needs

As part of our mission to help our members stay informed on what they need to know to keep their facilities compliant, last month ACD hosted a webinar, Protecting Chemical Distribution Facilities: Rolling Door Requirements for Energy, Fire and Life Safety, and Security Needs. Presented by McKeon, a leading manufacturer of fire doors, the webinar detailed rolling door requirements for chemical facilities and how these systems help chemical manufacturing and distribution facilities improve energy efficiency, maintain code compliance, protect occupants, and strengthen security. Over the course of the webinar, McKeon discussed three categories of rolling doors that are of use to our industry: energy, fire and life safety, and security.

Energy Conserving Doors

With an increasing number of states across the country adopting versions of the International Energy Conservation Code (IECC), attention to energy codes is more important than ever. Rolling service doors are often one of the largest and most overlooked openings in a building’s thermal envelope, and uncontrolled airflow drives energy waste, occupant discomfort, and even code violations. Energy codes set the minimum conservation requirement for a building, and the IECC counts air leakage both into and out of facilities (infiltration and exfiltration) against the same limit. By selecting energy-efficient door systems, facilities can both meet compliance goals while reducing energy waste and increasing comfort and indoor air quality.

Fire and Life Safety Doors

Chemical facility managers are well acquainted with fire safety rules, with one of the requirements of the International Building Code being fire and smoke separation throughout the building using fire-rated walls. But any time there’s a fire-rated wall, there’s also an opportunity for some type of fire door assembly. These openings allow building occupants to move throughout the building during normal operations, but more importantly, these fire door systems undergo extensive testing that verifies that during a fire emergency, occupants are able to exit the building.

Security Doors

Over the past few years, the chemical distribution industry has become the target of potential and emerging threats that require multiple layers of protection to keep facilities secure. Businesses like McKeon focus the majority of their research and development on designing high-security door systems that meet three types of ratings: bullet resistant, forced entry resistant, and blast resistant.

• Bullet resistant doors are useful for high-security applications and are developed to protect from outside attacks and are rated for resistance to a range of bullet and firearm varieties.
• Forced entry resistant door systems are used to protect sensitive materials and the people within the facility. These doors are subjected to specialized testing that evaluates how long doors can withstand attempts to breach them using designated tools.
• Blast resistant doors are particularly applicable to chemical facilities that handle hazardous or explosive materials and are tested to withstand significant pressure loads with minimal deformation, while remaining openable after the test.

If you are interested in learning more about the fundamentals of energy codes, building codes, and test standards that impact the design and installation of rolling door assemblies for chemical manufacturing and distribution facilities, and exploring different rolling door technologies that are designed to meet these codes and standards while complying with all life safety and means of egress requirements, watch the webinar recording here.