The fourteen-story Valencia building with a ventilated facade and polyurethane cladding is likely to mark a turning point in Spain, where such a blaze has not before occurred on a building of this type, though similar incidents have been seen in London and in China in past years.
Esther Puchades, vice secretary of the Valencia College of Industrial Technical Engineers (Cogitival) and a veteran in fire incident investigations, explained that polyurethane is not banned in construction. Yet the extreme intensity of this fire has prompted renewed consideration about using this material in certain applications.
She noted that polyurethane behaves like a plastic when heated and can ignite rapidly. At the same time, it continues to be used in construction today, but with fire barriers designed to stop its spread and with manufacturers actively seeking improvements in its composition.
The building features a ventilated facade, which introduces a gap between the brick and the exterior metal panels. The structure, completed in 2009 with mid to high-quality construction, was the subject of Puchades’s assessment in a related, nonmaterial matter.
Puchades pointed out that it is not currently possible to specify how many structures in the Valencia region or across Spain have employed polyurethane, a material common in construction particularly during the 2000s and early 2010s.
In her view, the focus now will be on locating where the fire began, how the building was designed, and how it was executed, given that the blaze occurred in a relatively modern building and thankfully did not affect residents while they slept.