Annex no.

Strategy for harmonization of national technical regulations for

construction with the European ones, concerning fire safety

1. Scope
Implementation of the Romanian legislative framework requirements which
transposed the acquis comunitaire relating to construction products, regarding
essential fire safety requirement at the technical construction regulations level
(regulations, codes / standards, guidelines, methodologies, technical
specifications).

2. Institutional framework
The strategy involves the conduct of actions at different levels of competence
and decision. In accordance with national legislation in force, the following
authorities have responsibilities in the field of technical regulations on essential
requirements to fire safety:

a. Ministry of Transport, Construction and Tourism, according to

Government Decision no. 412 from 23 rd of March 2004 regarding the
organization and functioning of the Ministry of Transport, Constructions
and Tourism, Government Decision no. 203/2003 regarding the approval
of the regulation on the types of technical standards and associated
costs of regulatory activity in construction, urban and territory planning,
habitat and methodology on initiating, acquiring, approval and exploiting
the technical construction regulations, approved by Order of MTCT no.
542/2003
o applies and oversees the European Agreement provisions, signed in
Brussels on the 1st of February 1993, ratified by Law no. 20/1993, in the
field of transport, construction and tourism, establishing an association
between Romania, on one part, and the European Communities and
their Member States, on the other part, and also the national and
sector strategy on preparing the adhesion of Romania to the European
Union, with subsequent amendments
o organizes the development, regulatory approval and approval of
technical and economical regulations for its areas of activity, and also
the training of professionals respecting the law; ensures the guidelines
and technical assistance for implementation of quality in construction
through technical and economic regulations, with the participation of

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 specialists from research, design, higher education and execution of
works in its fields of activity, organizes the audit regarding the
application of economic and technical regulations;
b. The State Inspection in Constructions – ISC - according to Government
Decision no. 63/2001 on establishing the State Inspection in Construction
– ISC, approved by Law no. 707/2001, Law no. 228 of 1 June 2004 for
approval of Government Decision no. 11/2004 on the establishment of
measures of reorganization within the central public administration and
the Regulation of organization and functioning of the State Inspection in
Construction - ISC approved by Decision of the Prime Minister no. 125 of
23.06.2004.
o proposes periodical changes necessary for the components of quality in
construction system concerning the content of technical regulations,
initiates proposals for regulations regarding the harmonization of
technical legislation in the construction quality with EU legislation.
o organizes, coordinates and exercises the control on the uniform
application of legal provisions in the field of construction quality.
c. General Department for Emergency Situations, according to the Rules of
organization and functioning and organization chart of the General
Department for Emergency Situations approved by Government Decision
no. 1490/2004, Government Decision no. 622 / 2004 establishing the
conditions for marketing of products for construction and the Order of the
MAI / MTCT no. 2134/460 of 17th of November 2004 approving the
procedure for appointing the bodies for attesting conformity of
construction products:
o develops general rules, which it submits the administration and interior
minister for approval;
o develops and delivers a methodology, rules, regulations, instructions,
and procedures and the advises those that are issued by ministries and
other public institutions;
o ensures the recognition and designation of the bodies involved in
certification of the products, on families of products, with a role in
meeting the requirement of fire safety;
o ensures the evaluation in order to recognize and designate the bodies
involved in certification of the products, on families of products, with a
role in meeting the requirement of fire safety;
o ensures the surveillance of the bodies involved in certification of the
products, on families of products, with a role in meeting the requirement
of fire safety;

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 o ensures the market surveillance of the products/families of products
with a role in meeting the requirement of fire safety.

3. Strategy elaboration
The main objective of harmonization of national technical regulations with the
EU it is represented by the necessity for the design and execution of
construction and the establishment of the specific national performance
parameters classes, so that in the event of an outbreak of fire to ensure:
• that the stability of the bearing elements of construction can be estimated
for a determined period of time;
• that the occurrence and spread of fire and smoke inside the building to be
limited;
• that the fire propagation to adjacent buildings to be limited;
• that the users can leave the building or can be saved through other means;

• that it is taken into account the safety of the intervention teams.

a. Currently harmonized national legislation with the European legislation is

presented in Annex. 1.
b. General strategic lines are required:

• Medium term
o a need to revise the norm for fire safety in buildings, indicative P118-
99 and the Handbook with exemplifications, detailing and solutions
for implementing the norm of the fire safety construction, P118-99 -
indicative, MP 008/2000, pursuing the disposal of the rigid
requirements, those that are not harmonized and the replacement
with solutions for European-type design that do not represent
barriers for technical progress:
 use of construction products with CE marking/CS, according
to European regulations;
 including new classes of systems of reaction to fire and
resistance to fire and the levels allowed for products for
construction, correlated with the specific performance criteria
laid down in Regulation concerning the classification and the
categorization of construction products for the performance
of fire behavior approved by MIA-MTCT Order no. 1822/394 /
2004;
 waiver of " fire danger categories " for the classification of
risk of fire in industrial and warehouses building and the
introduction of “fire risk” concept;

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  establish performance criteria for fire safety in accordance
with the Interpretative Document no. 2 provisions;
 estimation of some products’ performance or structures by
using parametric curves or nominal temperature - time;
 achieve a balance between active and passive fire protection
measures, established by the project, in order to ensure the
fire safety essential requirement;
 symbols and terminology specific to Europe;
o the harmonization of the norms for the design and
execution of construction related facilities (sanitary, electrical, ventilation
and air conditioning, heating) and the specific regulations concerning the
design, installation and execution of fire (water, powder, foam, substances
with special), installation of signal detection and fire, safety lighting, and
installation of exhaust smoke and hot gases with the Romanian
harmonized standards (Annex 2) in order to:
 include new systems of classes and fire resistance levels
permitted for products (pipes and channels technical, electrical cables,
ventilation channels) for use in installations that correlated with the specific
performance criteria they laid down in Regulation on the classification and
categorization for construction products based on performances in fire
behavior, approved by Order No. MIA-MTCT. 1822/394 / 2004 ;
 entering classes of external fire performance for roofs and
coverings for roofs;
 the introduction of principles and specific performance criteria
established by the interpretative document No. 2 - Fire Safety and
Romanian standards which transpose the harmonized European
standards (Annex 2);
 the introduction of principles of design, execution and operation
set by Romanian standards transposing the specific European standards.
o an identification of all national technical regulations that made the old
system combustibility classes and levels of fire resistance (determined on
the basis of the tests specified standards and STAS 7771/1-3 and STAS
11357, now canceled);
o an intervention to authorities for inclusion in the drafting of
regulations for 2005 and 2006, a review of the regulations mentioned
above;
o a revision of norms and general provisions for fire safety and
prevention to harmonize with the specific provisions of Interpretative
Document 2 - Fire safety, covering:
 safety intervention teams;
 users evacuation;

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  performance criteria for buildings and relate facilities for
extinguishing fire and limit the detection and alarm in case of
fire;
 performance criteria and principles to meet the requirement
for verification of essential fire safety;
 carrying ability of structures (stability to fire);
 limit the spread of fire and smoke inside the building (inside
and outside the chamber hole) and neighborhoods;
 specific terminology (SR EN ISO 13943 - Fire Safety -
Vocabulary);
 specifications on the location of buildings, structures
performance, products for construction, utilities and
installations.
o the analysis of ways and possibilities of introducing the
concept of scenario fire, drawing the Interpretative Document 2 - Security
on fire, and ISO/TR 13387-2:1999 - Fire safety engineering - Part 2:
Design fire scenarios and design fires (design fire scenarios and fire
calculation) on the design of national construction, taking into account that
this document (technical report) is not yet adopted as an European or
national standard;
o introducing into the teaching plan of the Fire Department
of the topics to be studied the European and international documents on
fire safety engineering (Annex 2), and depending on case, even at the
Universities of Architecture and Construction.
 Long-term:
o an analysis of ways and possibilities of introducing the concept of
fire risk in the acceptance of European standards and specific
evaluation systems;
o transition to a structural fire design of buildings (structures of
concrete, steel, mixed concrete and steel, wood, masonry) on the
application of Romanian standards which transpose the euro codes
design fire (European standards that adopt these euro codes), as
adopted the euro codes such as European standards (Annex 2);
o use a the euro codes (performances and properties determined by
calculation for the construction elements) in developing technical
specifications and harmonized technical specifications for
construction products having an essential requirement in meeting
fire safety, according to Community Guide L.
o an intervention to the organizations and institutions enabled
implement a new design concepts, given the following:
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 o setting and respecting the deadlines and the coexistence of the new
regulations with national regulations, in accordance with Community
Guide L - "Using and applying the euro codes for structural design of
constructions”;
 respecting the timelines of establishing the parameters
determined at the national level (national Annex), specify in the
Community Guide L;
 the deadlines relating to the withdrawal (cancellation)
conflicting national regulations, specified in the Community
Guide L;
 parts referring to fire in euro codes for structures, treating
specific aspects of passive fire protection in terms of
calculation of structures and parts thereof to obtain a suitable
resilient bearing elements and a limitation of any fire, without
determining functions and levels performance requirements,
which can be expressed in values of resistance to fire roll
(standard), generally are required to be specified in the
regulations of National Fire Safety (Safety norm-fire indication
P118);
 the euro codes do not establish requirements for building on
the destination or compartment fire, the use of approved
insulating material and coverings, including their maintenance,
composition and dimensions of the evacuation routes,
evacuation of smoke and hot gases, limiting the spread of fire
and smoke in the compartment of fire , equipping with the
signaling and extinguishing fire systems, utility installations for
buildings, access roads, intervention and rescue, and others,
the indication is also in their content as these conditions are
subject to specifications set by the authorities.
o an analysis and identification of the situations that require the introduction
and establishment of classes or specific performance requirements for fire
safety, as required by the national specificities, according to Government
Decision no. 622/2004 and Interpretative Document no.2 - security fire;
o the application of the Romanian specific harmonized standards on
achievement and verification of fire proofing for construction structures
and products;
o setting in the technical regulations the possibilities of acceptance of
meeting fire safety requirements by adopting several methods such as
those related to security engineering techniques and use of fire tests in
large scale (Guide G);

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o analyzing the implications of European requirement for removal of
services technical barriers have upon the national regulations regarding
the services (design, verification projects, assembling, checking
equipment, etc..).