Passive Fire Protection for a New Generation of Energy Facilities

Owen Morris on passive fire protection for a new generation of energy facilities

Ahead of his presentation at ADIPEC 2026, Owen Morris explains how he came to specialize in passive fire protection, and why decisions about it need to be made early and backed by evidence. 

Owen Morris is a Senior Fire Protection Specialist at AkzoNobel, focused on passive fire protection (PFP) for the energy and infrastructure sectors. He has more than 15 years of experience across the coatings industry, in research and development, product innovation and customer-facing roles in the UK and Japan. He holds several patents relating to PFP technologies and regularly supports technical conferences, fire testing programs and standards development. At ADIPEC 2026 in Abu Dhabi (2-5 November), he’ll present on how the timing of PFP decisions affects performance in energy infrastructure, sharing findings from new testing on hydrogen jet fires, cryogenic exposure and battery fires.

What does your role involve day to day?

I work closely with our key account managers and sales teams on live projects, helping customers turn fire risk and performance requirements into a practical PFP approach that’s defensible and buildable. The other half of my role is building the evidence behind what we recommend, which can involve shaping test and approval programs and turning the results into guidance project teams can use with confidence. I’m most involved from the early FEED stage of a project into the detailed design phase, when projects are defining hazards and setting their fire protection philosophy. 

How did you come to specialize in PFP?

I came into the industry from chemistry R&D. I have a master’s degree in chemistry and started out working on finish coats. The turning point was an article about geopolymers that I read in my own time. I wasn’t convinced by the more sensational claims, but it made me realize the underlying chemistry could have real potential in coatings. After I’d begun exploring it alongside my core role, a colleague saw its relevance to fire protection. That led me into PFP, where I went on to develop a new fire protection product.       

I spent around ten years in Japan supporting both oil and gas and the Japanese architectural market, and I’ve also worked on high-heat coatings for military and aerospace environments. Across those sectors, you learn quickly that performance on paper isn’t enough. You need solutions that are practical to specify, apply and maintain. 

Your presentation argues that PFP delivers the greatest value when it’s considered early in design. Why is that becoming more pressing? 

As projects take on hazards such as hydrogen jet fires, cryogenic spills and sequential fire events, while a specification can look compliant on paper, the PFP system hasn’t been validated against the fire exposure the asset may actually face. The biggest risk is a false sense of security. Finding those gaps late in a project also brings cost and schedule implications, from revised coating thicknesses to changes in access and application details. 

As downstream sites become energy hubs combining LNG, hydrogen, carbon capture and battery storage, how are your conversations with owners and EPCs changing?

They’re shifting from “select a solution” to “prove it for the real scenario.” Owners and EPCs are taking emerging risks more seriously, so there’s less reliance on legacy assumptions and more focus on what evidence exists and where its limits are.  

We’re increasingly brought in to validate test evidence and run bespoke testing for specific scenarios, because standard tests don’t always reflect the exact geometry or exposure a project is concerned about. That links directly to earlier design input, where we help design out details that are hard to protect.   

Why is ADIPEC the right place for this conversation, and what do you want people to take away?

ADIPEC brings together the people who influence PFP outcomes, such as owners setting the risk appetite, EPCs translating that into design and specifications, and the supply chain that has to deliver it on site. The core message of my presentation is that PFP shouldn’t be treated as a commodity or a late bolt-on. It’s a safety-critical system that should be designed in from the outset. 

I’m hoping to hear what people are actually encountering on projects as facilities become more complex, where assumptions are being challenged, where existing test evidence is being stretched, and which scenarios are driving the toughest decisions. That helps us focus our testing on real conditions, rather than relying on “it worked for hydrocarbons, so it must be fine here.”  

Owen Morris presents at ADIPEC 2026 in Abu Dhabi, where he’ll share his findings in full. To discuss passive fire protection for your project, contact the International fire protection team.