If your property is identified within the bushfire prone land then your development is required to comply with bushfire standards. Depending on your development, there are a range of approval and certifying pathways. BEMC provide fire building and planning compliance in Newcastle, the Hunter Valley, the Mid North Coast, the Central Coast, Port Stephens and surrounds.
If the project has failed to undertake any bushfire planning, bushfire assessment or bushfire report within the planning stage, the consent authority may request a retrospective assessment to ensure the development complies with bushfire requirements.
We assist homeowners, builders, developers and architects/building designers to work through the maze of requirements. Our professionals will help you meet with the provision of the Planning for Bushfire Protection and AS 3959 Construction of Buildings in Bushfire prone areas.
A site inspection will be required to determine what elements of the construction satisfy the provisions and identify what provisions have not been fully met. Consultation with the landowner will be undertaken to ensure they understand all options and processes to successfully complete the project.
If you are thinking of purchasing vacant land and would like a constraints study to help identify development options, we can provide a bushfire pre-construction constraint assessment. This is a desktop assessment of the proposed development that provides a BAL report (Bushfire Attack Level) that indicates bushfire construction standards, design and layout features that need to be considered within the development.
These assessments are a quick snapshot of the site and provide the client with an indication of the significant bushfire elements. If you are thinking of purchasing vacant land and would like a bushfire constraints study to help identify development options, a pre-construction constraint assessment provides you with this information.
This report can be provided to the builder, architect or building designer to ensure the significant bushfire requirements are considered early within the design stage – prior to submission for the development application.
Our advice is aimed at minimising the BAL (Bushfire Attack Level) and providing guidance on best design practises to withstand a bushfire attack. This provides a level of certainty prior to submitting your development application.
In some cases – when complex developments or limited space to develop leads to a situation where bushfire provisions can’t be met – a bushfire design briefing is developed to identify the elements which do meet compliance and how assessment will be performed.
A bushfire analysis report is the first step in a performance-based solution and forms the basis of the ensuing analysis. This complex bushfire report is an important part of the performance-based design process, as it allows the objectives, proposed design, analysis methods, assumptions and acceptance criteria to be agreed on in order to validate the bushfire analysis. The compliance approach needs to be agreed on by NSW RFS as part of the briefing. The approach may be based on equivalency to the acceptable solutions, direct compliance with the performance criteria, or a combination of these.
The complexity of the bushfire design briefing will vary depending on the complexity of the bushfire issues being considered. The process by which the bushfire design briefing is undertaken shall be documented as part of the bushfire analysis report.
Planning for bushfire protection provides an assessment pathway when there is no forested vegetation within the 140m assessable area, and the only vegetation is unmanaged grasslands. The bushfire provisions consider the lower intensity fire that grasslands generate in consideration to forested vegetation.
The National Construction Code is a series of requirements that cover all types of construction standards, including bushfire requirements. The document can refer to other documents to support the construction requirements. For bushfire requirements, refer to the Australian Standards AS3959 Construction of buildings in bushfire prone areas. There are a variety of state variations within the NCC that need to be considered.
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FPA Bronze Member
BPAD Accredited
FPA Bronze Member