THE GRENFELL inquiry heard that a test at the Building Research Establishment (BRE) of Kingspan’s Kooltherm K15 product was ‘allowed to keep burning’ after it had failed, with this report’s results used for 29 desktop studies by Kingspan.
Philip Clark, BRE’s former burn hall manager, began his evidence at the inquiry this week by denying any knowledge of ‘undeclared’ fire resistant boards on a ‘critical’ test of Celotex insulation pre Grenfell, and later blamed a ‘typographical error’ that meant it took five minutes instead of ten for flames to climb up Kingspan’s K15 in a test where it was combined with high pressure laminate cladding.
Now, ITV News, Inside Housing and BD Online have all reported on his continued evidence, in which the inquiry heard that a test of K15 failed ‘where officials were not following safety instructions’, with the test in 2014 at BRE seeing flames spread up the right and ‘allowed to keep burning after they climbed over the top of the equipment’. This is despite the documentation for BS 8414 stating that a test ‘should be terminated early if flames spread above the top of the testing rig’.
Footage of the test and its documentation were shown during Mr Clark’s evidence, and he suggested that ignoring the standard was ‘common practice’ in the fire testing industry, while his ‘main criteria for terminating’ tests was risks to staff or equipment. He commented: ‘This had always been common practice from day one every single test I’ve ever performed with me or other people that has always been the way and carried on in that regard.’
While BRE not terminating it did not cause the test’s failure, Mr Clark added: ‘If we deemed it to not be unsafe we would allow that system to carry on burning so that knowledge could be gained from how it performed in other ways. That has always been the practice I’ve always done it’s always been with every other person that’s ever run a test in the whole of my career.’
He noted in turn that if a rig was allowed to keep burning this way it would not go on and pass, and the ‘termination point’ would be noted in the report after a review of footage and notes. Pushed on why it was allowed to keep burning, he said: ‘Failures are as valuable as passes. If you just terminated everything you would never learn anything and no progress would ever be made.’
The test was used by Kingspan to ‘help secure’ 29 reports justifying use of K15 on high rises, as BRE ‘diverted from its usual practice’ and provided a written report despite the failure. Mr Clark accepted that the written report did ‘not make it very clear the test has failed’, with Kingspan using it to secure 29 desktop assessments, three of which were written by BRE, and none of which ‘identified the fact that the test had failed’.
Inquiry counsel Richard Millett said ‘take it from me that not a single one of those desktop assessments, including the ones done by the BRE, refers to the fact that the March 2014 test failed to meet the BR 135 criteria’, asking Mr Clark ‘did you know that?’. In response, Mr Clark said ‘I did not know that and I’m surprised… I find that very strange and slightly shocking’.
Email evidence shown later that day showed BRE was warned in 2013 that Kingspan was ‘misusing’ a separate 2005 test to sell K15 for use in a ‘wide variety of cladding systems’ for buildings above 18m, while video evidence from the March 2014 test was shown from his helmet camera. He was recorded saying he was ‘happy to carry on’, and asked by Kingspan’s technical project manager Ivor Meredith if it had failed.
In response, Mr Clark said he was ‘on the fence at the moment’ and was ‘going to let it run’, but told the inquiry he knew at this point it had failed, but this was a ‘polite way’ of telling Kingspan he could not confirm it had, stating that a ‘lesser man might have put that out’. As he wrote notes stating the flames had passed the top of the rig, Mr Meredith said ‘can’t you just delete the whole sentence’, to which he responded ‘I will put…’ before trailing off.
Mr Millett said that ‘it looks from this that you were writing your notes in collaboration with Mr Meredith’, to which Mr Clark retorted ‘there was no collaboration in any way, shape or form’. He added that if he had anything to hide he would not have worn the helmet camera, with the inquiry hearing Kingspan lodged a formal complaint seeking to have the test reassessed as a pass. BRE agreed to write a report even though ‘it had not’.
On this, Mr Clark accepted ‘this was against normal procedure’, and was shown a 2010 email from his boss Tony Baker, which noted a ‘specific fear’ that Kingspan ‘would try to pass off indicative [reports] as being full tests’ if issued. Despite this, Mr Clark said he was ‘told to prepare’ a report and ‘was very uncomfortable issuing it’.
Mr Millett asked if ‘very great care would need to be taken’ to make it clear the test had failed, and Mr Clarke agreed, but added that ‘the test report doesn’t necessarily make it very clear unless you read it carefully that the test has failed’. This particular report’s only reference to the failure was a page showing the timeline, stating that at 43 minutes there was ‘flaming above rig’ and that this was the ‘end of test’.
On the Celotex test he had previously been questioned about, footage was shown from his helmet during that test showing he told Celotex’s then assistant product manger Jonathan Roper ‘see how that flame seems to have ceased now that the board is there because you’re losing a lot of the energy from behind it’, and that ‘the other thing as well is it’s something that’s quite big behind the board [because] it extends the flame vents’.
Asked by inquiry chair Sir Martin Moore-Bick why he said ‘now that the board is there’, Mr Clark said ‘I don’t know, it’s just speaking – a general conversation’. Asked in turn about talking about something behind the board, he said he had ‘been referring to flames’, while another exchange recorded saw him say ‘sometimes changing two things at a time doesn’t always give you an advantage’.
Mr Millett suggested this referred to the fire resistant boards and thicker panels hiding them, but Mr Clark denied he knew two things had changed, and said he was referring to ‘the scientific principle that if you change two key items, two key variables, you don’t know which one has had a positive effect’.
He was later accused of providing false evidence, after claiming earlier this week he had been given ‘no access’ to files on BRE’s systems when preparing his witness statement, stating at the time: ‘One of the things you need to be aware of is that post the fire at the tower, all of the systems that - both paper and electronic - were locked down at BRE, so I had no access to any files on any of the systems. So anything that I was given, I was reliant on BRE to provide me.’
However, BRE’s lawyers Fieldfisher sent a letter to the inquiry that stated Mr Clark ‘had in fact’ been given full access for three days in July 2019. Mr Millett asked if he had attended BRE’s site to do so, and Mr Clark said ‘I did for about one or two days, maybe’. Mr Millett reiterated that the lawyers had said three days, to which Mr Clarke said yes, that’s probably right, yes’.
Mr Millett said in turn that ‘when you told us yesterday in your evidence that you were reliant on what was sent to you, you were issued a packet of stuff, material was disclosed by the Inquiry, and you had no access to files after the fire on any of the systems, that’s not true, is it?’. Mr Clarke said: ‘Yes, no, I’d neglected to - I forgot that I - I understood that I went down there, but what I meant was I had - because I was only there - I could only review a certain amount of stuff. I just forgot I’d gone there. I’ve never been in this situation. I don’t know what’s relevant.’
At the end of his evidence, Mr Clark was given the opportunity to say whether he wished he could change any of his actions, and he responded: ‘I never wanted to be in a position where what we have done has caused such a disaster.’
After he had finished giving evidence, his former boss Stephen Howard – business group manager at BRE – was asked about his response to an email from Celotex in 2013, which said that the ‘critical’ 2005 Kingspan test that paired K15 with a cement particle board ‘does not cover the majority of the market in which they are being used’.
The email added: ‘We are aware that this product is being used in buildings above 18m using a wide variety of constructions, some on to masonry, some onto steel frame, with ACM panel cladding, terracotta, etc. We are surprised they feel confident enough to allow their product to be used in buildings their fire test doesn't cover.’
Asked what he did when he received this, Mr Howard said he asked Mr Roper for more information was ‘unable to act’ without receiving it, and BD Online noted that this test was not officially passed or failed until 2015 when Kingspan ‘under pressure from building control inspectors belatedly sought one’.
Mr Baker had been ‘initially reluctant’ to provide one, stating that ‘I doubt this would be considered a complete system. Data such as this has been misrepresented in the market in the past’. However, Mr Howard told a junior colleague to prepare a draft, which was then issued to Kingspan, and he disagreed with Mr Baker’s assessment as the original test ‘had not been marked as indicative and it was not up to’ BRE to ‘make judgements about the suitability of the system in the real world’.