How Oxygen-Reduced Air Prevents Fire
A FirePASS® fire prevention environment is created by continuously ventilating a protected space with hypoxic, oxygen-reduced air. By lowering and controlling the oxygen concentration, FirePASS® creates conditions in which many common combustible materials are significantly more difficult to ignite.
Unlike conventional fire suppression systems that respond after ignition, oxygen reduction fire prevention maintains a protective atmosphere continuously, reducing the risk of fire before it can develop.
Hypoxic air is produced by partly filtering out oxygen from ambient atmospheric air, thus typically reducing the oxygen content to 15%, compared to the normal amount of 20.9%. This oxygen level corresponds to the partial pressure of oxygen at an altitude of around 2.700m (9.000ft).
No unsafe nitrogen dilution
FirePASS doesn’t use the unsafe nitrogen dilution concept offered by competition tying to circumventing our patents. Unlike safe and healthy oxyreduct ventilation, nitrogen injection may cause lethal accidents and does not provide sufficient ventilation of an area to be protected.
Hypoxic ventilation was first introduced 20 years ago for athletic training and medical treatment by our affiliated company Hypoxico Inc. in New York. Since then thousands of people around the world train and sleep in hypoxic atmospheres every day: (www.hypoxico.eu).
Please contact us for scientific information.
Safe working conditions
Most common flammable solid materials and liquids cannot be ignited in environments with an oxygen level lower than 16%. However, humans easily tolerate an oxyreduct atmosphere of 14-16% O2 without any health hazards (instead of 20.9% O2 as in natural, ambient air).
Anybody traveling on a modern passenger airplane has experienced oxygen concentrations of around 15%. In addition, millions of residents live in altitudes of 3.500m / 11.000ft and above, such as in La Paz, Bolivia, without showing any impairment of their physiological functions.
Scientific research has proven that working in such oxyreduct conditions does not impose any health hazards on normal healthy human beings.
Continuous Oxygen Reduction Fire Prevention
FirePASS® combines oxygen-reduced air, continuous ventilation, oxygen monitoring and intelligent system control to maintain the engineered atmosphere within the protected space.
Instead of waiting for a fire to be detected, the system maintains fire-preventive conditions continuously. This makes oxygen reduction fire prevention particularly relevant for controlled environments where fire, smoke or conventional extinguishing methods could threaten critical assets or operations.
Learn more about how FirePASS® works, explore the science behind oxygen reduction fire prevention, or discover FirePASS® solutions for different fire prevention applications.