[labnetwork] Fire Alarm and HAZMAT panels

[Vito Logiudice]

Hi Michael,

In our particular case, the complex in which the cleanroom sits serves
many different purposes ranging from undergraduate labs, seminar rooms,
graduate labs, office space and a 220-seat auditorium. The building¹s
design is such that the cleanroom sits at the ³front² of the building on
its own foundation and with its own separate air handling system. Thus,
the decision was made early on to separate the TGMS panel from the fire
panel to avoid dumping the entire 280,000 sq.ft. complex should the TGMS
system be triggered. The TGMS is tied into each gas cabinet and is
designed to stop the offending gas flow in the event of a level 2 alarm.
All gases within the facility will be shut off at source should one of the
EGO pushbuttons around the perimeter of the facility be triggered by a lab
occupant.

We do not have a HAZMAT system with separate emergency pull stations. We
instruct our lab members to defer to the TGMS EGO pushbuttons in the event
of any non-gas, non-fire related emergency (chemical or otherwise) as a
means of evacuating the cleanroom quickly. This may not be the best
approach since gas flows are needlessly interrupted in the event of a
non-gas emergency but it helps make our emergency response protocol
somewhat simpler to convey and execute.

FYI, our system monitors for leaks at each gas cabinet exhaust as well as
at all exhausted MFC cabinets or enclosures (we don¹t have any VMB¹s but
do have exhausted gas ³pods² which hold MFC¹s such as those for our RIE
systems). Between these enclosures, all toxic gas lines are run in orbital
welded, coax lines. Since these lines are welded and given the large
number of (diluting) air changes occurring within the facility, we decided
not to include room sensors early on during the design phase.

Best,
Vito
--
Vito Logiudice  P.Eng.
Director of Operations, Quantum NanoFab
University of Waterloo
Lazaridis QNC 1207
200 University Avenue West
Waterloo, ON           Canada N2L 3G1
Tel.: (519) 888-4567  ext. 38703
Email: vito.logiudice at uwaterloo.ca
Website: https://fab.qnc.uwaterloo.ca





-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Khbeis <khbeis at uw.edu>
Date: Thursday, October 22, 2015 at 7:55 PM
To: "labnetwork at mtl.mit.edu" <labnetwork at mtl.mit.edu>
Subject: [labnetwork] Fire Alarm and HAZMAT panels

>Dear Colleagues, 
>
>We are finalizing designs for our cleanroom renovation and a question
>regarding how Fire Alarm and HAZMAT panels are integrated came up.
>Currently our HAZMAT panel with toxic gas monitors, gas cabinets, and
>burn-box monitor also has yellow pull stations and HAZMAT alarms on it.
>HAZMAT alarms trigger a relocation alarm but not a fire alarm for the
>whole building. High level gas leak will trigger the fire alarm panel and
>dump the building. We have several issues with this architecture - for
>example currently it is all or nothing so if one of the gas cabinets has
>a problem they all get tripped. Also, if we are working on a system the
>pull stations and strobes have to be bypassed.  Clearly less than ideal.
>Another issue is the fire code isn¹t really geared toward semiconductor
>fab facilities, so our code description is lacking.
>
>For those of you with experience or relatively new facilities, can you
>please share a little about your system architecture and HAZMAT/TGM
>systems?  Also, we are planning on migrating from our Zellweger/MDA
>System 16 to remote gas monitoring.  Can I please have some feedback on
>experience with remote monitors and replacement/maintenance vs the
>central systems?
>
>Gratefully, 
>
>Dr. Michael Khbeis
>Associate Director, Washington Nanofabrication Facility (WNF)
>National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN)
>University of Washington
>Fluke Hall, Box 352143
>(O) 206.543.5101
>(F) 206.221.1681
>(C) 443.254.5192
>khbeis at uw.edu
>www.wnf.washington.edu/
>
>
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