In 2017 the Directorate General of Dubai Civil Defence (DCD), under the leadership of Major General Expert Rashid Thani Al Matrooshi and Brigadier Expert Ali Al Mutawa, embarked on developing, planning, constructing and implementing Dubai’s first-ever government-controlled facility, Emirates Safety Laboratory (ESL) located in Al Warsan 3, for fire testing and product certification services, with a focus on fire safety within the UAE, GCC, greater Middle East, North Africa and Indian sub-continent regions.
Leading the project for DCD over the recent years was Major Khalid Saeed Abdulla AlTunaji, who embarked on bringing together numerous international and regional Testing, Inspection and Certification (TIC) Industry specialists and experts to oversee the project from concept, construction, testing, commissioning and accrediting to commercially operating facility.
The project’s initial technical, construction and human resource aspects were under the guidance and oversight of Dr Sebastian Ukleja, Testing Manager, Dr Andrzej Borowy, Technical and Quality Manager and Eng. Tomasz Kielbasa, Certification Manager, with Major Khalid. It was completed and obtained accreditation, including recognition as a testing and certification body on the UAE-approved 2022 list of companies, laboratories and expertise houses. Coinciding with the commencement of commercial operations, DCD added to the team David Campbell, General Manager, who has extensive experience providing testing and certification services across the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe and is assisting ESL with the day-to-day management, understanding the various markets and customer needs, and developing the focus required by clients in this greater region.
ESL has 50+ employees who collectively have decades of experience working within numerous vital sectors, including TIC, manufacturing, construction, environment & energy (including oil and gas), data communications, aerospace, defence, and transportation, including maritime. This team brings to ESL a wealth of expertise in fire and life safety, including from academia, product development and production, contracting, design, consulting and advisory, inspection, auditing, training and quality assurance, facility and machine management, health and safety, environment and security, and skilled artisans.
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What is ESL?
The result of the past five years’ investment is that ESL is one of the most extensive facilities for undertaking product/system fire testing and conformity assessment certification, assisting manufacturers, construction contractors, consultants and advisory in achieving product certification and market entry into the more significant Middle Eastern regions.
ESL has collaborated with European entities to offer their valued customers access to CE and UKCA marking for market entry into the European Union’s single market. ESL undertakes testing to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Fire and Life Safety Code of Practice, the North American Standards (ANSI, ASTM, NFPA, UL, ULC, etc.), International Standard Organisation (ISO), European Standards (EN), British Standards (BS) and various other globally recognised international standards.
The testing laboratory operates following the ISO/IEC 17025 standard requirements, with the conformity assessment body (certification) operating under the provisions of the ISO/IEC 17065 standard. It is accredited by IAS, EIAC, GAC and ENAS to provide testing to approximately 90+ standards and certification to 600+ standards. ESL additionally offers the facility to academia and manufacturers for research and development testing for the development of new codes and standards, innovative products and materials and new fire-safety manufactured goods before proceeding with type testing of the finalised design being engineered for the market.
One of the aims of ESL is to ensure a safer and sustainable future together with our corporate and community key stakeholders. The testing laboratory houses cutting-edge technology that tests the products and materials to the applicable standards with high-quality efficiency whilst mitigating and reducing risks of environmental pollution. This is in line with the Dubai Clean Energy Strategy 2050, which aims to use energy efficiently and without damage to the environment.
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The need for better quality safety products and standards
How can someone ensure the quality of products and services? Various local, international and regional standards guide the manufacturing of products and systems and the required performance. These standards also guide industrial or product designers and developers to achieve the proper design and provide guidelines to manufacturers in product manufacturing processes. The purpose of ESL here is to ensure relevant standards are being followed and meeting these requirements by delivering testing and certification services in the fire and life safety industry. And to ensure a safer and sustainable future, ESL not only focuses on Standards but also on national, international and regional codes, which also guide us on the pre- and post-installation and construction for the inspection and maintenance works.
Key differentiators between ESL and their competitors
ESL’s customer-based approach, with their understanding of the region and market, is one of the key differentiators between ESL and the competition. ESL also focuses on having high standards in the fire and life safety community. Keeping that in mind, we interact with the customers, listen to, and understand their needs and expectations and involve clients in the process. ESL breaks down traditional barriers encountered by customers in this region that they have typically experienced from the large multinational TIC providers who apply a copy-paste blueprint approach to a region that very much needs a tailored solution customised for these geographies.
ESL regularly engages with customers and performs market surveys to understand better industry needs, the latest market practices and the latest expectations. This helps ESL continually improve, keep their customer-focused approach and provide better competitive solutions to manufacturers’ needs. ESL’s emphasis is not limited to just product testing and certification; they also support the clients through the complexities of product registration and facilitate by offering a Market Entry service where they play a vital role in assisting the submission and processing of UAE CD product registration for bringing products in the market.
To better support customers, ESL recently opened their new Customer Support Office located at Dubai Civil Defence’s Al Twar Centre, at Al Nahda Road, Al Twar2 area next to Al Qusais metro station, where customers can meet with technical experts to discuss their testing and certification needs and obtain easy-reach support to help them understand the requirements and application process to achieve certification and a UAE CoC.
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Where ESL can support
ESL to date has been granted accreditation and covers quite a substantial scope both for Passive and Active fire-safety standards:
Testing, certification and post-certification services
Passive: Resistance to fire, reaction to fire and propagation of fire, that include façade products & systems, fire rated walls & separating elements, fire & smoke dampers, ducts, ventilation systems, firestopping systems, roofing systems, safety glazing, fire doors & hardware, and fire-rated cables to name several.
Active: Electrical products/systems like fire detection and alarm systems, emergency lighting exit signs, door hardware, solar panels & inverters, extinguishing and suppression products & systems, liquid petroleum gas (LPG) products & systems, and flammable/combustible liquids.
Marking/labelling: How to identify if the product installed in the market is tested and certified after installation? Marking/labelling provided by ESL is one of the resources which can give an individual a way to track the certificate and its validity in the ESL Web Portal.
Registrations: As said before, ESL is not limited only to Testing and Certification Services alone; ESL also supports customers registering with Dubai Civil Defence in different sectors like vendor registration, agent registration, distributor registration, factory registration, installer registration, etc.
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Training, research and development
ESL believes it is essential to give back to the community more than the organisation takes. With this belief in mind, ESL already has a plan to introduce beneficial training and development programmes for the greater Middle East region to support manufacturing sector personnel, contractors, distributors, system integrators and other parties to improve their understanding of the UAE FLS Code Manual of practice, technical competence, and to help execute their quality control standards.
ESL will also collaborate with various educational units, providing internships, participating in university graduate programmes, developing a traineeship programme, and engaging in training and research programmes involving fresh graduates.
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It is essential to constantly support and help the market by listening to our customers and potential new partners’ needs and adding new creative services where the demand is realised and expanding into new markets to support the various geographies and AHJs. ESL welcomes innovative new products and technologies that are planned to enter the market and looks forward to collaborating with product designers to develop new test standards for these products’ safety and compliance acceptance. ESL is here to help.
For more information, go to www.emirateslaboratory.com
Email: Ask@EmiratesLaboratory.com
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/emirates-safety-laboratory-esl
