AllShield, developer of the non-combustible BarrierSheet® for commercial roofs with solar panels, has raised €4.7 million. The round was led by Move Energy, with participation from new and existing shareholders. The capital will be used to expand AllShield's new factory in Ter Aar, scale its European rollout through an exclusive commercial partnership with Owens Corning, and prepare its first production line in the United States.
PV panels do more than introduce an ignition risk. They change flame behaviour, heat exposure and fire propagation across the roof. FM and ZAG testing shows why the complete roof and PV assembly determines what happens after ignition.
Better components, installation and monitoring reduce the chance of a rooftop PV fire, but they cannot eliminate it. Olivier Langejan applies five established risk models to one question: if ignition still occurs above a combustible roof, what must the roof itself achieve?
RC62 places the complete roof-PV system at the centre of fire-risk management. For existing commercial roofs containing combustible materials, the challenge is to combine measures that reduce ignition probability with an appropriate roof strategy before PV is installed.
Skylights interrupt the normal roof build-up and introduce transitions between different materials and details. When PV is installed nearby, these interfaces deserve explicit attention so that the field of the roof and its openings are assessed as one system.
Fire safety thinking for rooftop solar has evolved significantly over the past three decades. What started as a focus on electrical faults in PV systems has gradually expanded into a broader understanding of installation quality, ageing systems and the interaction between PV arrays and roof constructions. This article explains the four phases of PV fire safety thinking and what the next phase may look like.
Installing PV on an existing commercial roof changes both loading and fire exposure. Before selecting the PV system, assess the roof itself: structure, insulation, waterproofing, remaining service life, fire behaviour and the evidence available for the proposed roof-PV build-up.
Rooftop PV fire safety is not one problem and therefore has no single solution. Electrical design, installation, monitoring, array geometry and roof construction influence different stages of the risk. A structured model helps distinguish what each measure achieves and what remains if earlier controls fail.
On large commercial roofs, passive fire protection must also be practical to install. AllShield BarrierSheet can be incorporated into the PIR roofing workflow using familiar roofing equipment, while the final fixing pattern remains determined by the installation guide and project-specific wind-uplift requirements.
AllShield BarrierSheet is included in RoofNav assembly 568563-0-0 under FM Approvals Report PR472014, covering FM 4470 and FM 4478. This provides a defined FM Approved route for specified commercial roof-PV configurations.
AllShield BarrierSheet is included in specified FM Approved roof assemblies under FM 4470 and Approval Report PR472014. For commercial roof projects, this provides recognised system evidence for defined roof constructions rather than relying only on individual material properties.
BROOF(t1) is important evidence for the external fire performance of a defined roof construction. Rooftop PV introduces a different geometry and exposure above that roof, so conventional roof classification and PV-specific evidence answer different but complementary questions.
