Chartered Fire Engineers for Your Building Project
A fire engineer is a professional who applies engineering and fire science to design buildings that protect people from fire: working out how a building will behave in a fire and designing the escape routes, compartmentation, detection and firefighting provisions that keep occupants safe. Fire engineers author fire strategies, support building control and Building Safety Act approvals, and justify designs that standard guidance cannot. SustainPlan connects you with chartered fire engineers across England and Wales.
Tell us about your project and we will match you with a chartered fire engineer.
What does a fire engineer do?
Fire engineering is the application of science and engineering to fire safety: understanding how fire starts, grows and spreads, how smoke moves, how people behave when evacuating, and how structures respond to heat: and using that understanding to design safe buildings. A fire engineer (also searched as a fire engineering consultant) puts that discipline to work on real projects:
Authoring fire strategies, the fire strategy report and drawings that demonstrate a design complies with the Building Regulations.
Performance-based design (where Approved Document B (the standard guidance; 2019 edition as amended in England, separate Welsh edition) does not fit the building, using BS 7974:2019) the British Standard framework for fire safety engineering, supported by the PD 7974 series of technical guidance, to justify the design by calculation and analysis: smoke modelling, evacuation analysis, structural fire engineering.
Regulatory approvals: supporting submissions to building control, registered building control approvers and the Building Safety Regulator (BSR), including the Gateway 2 building control approval application for higher-risk buildings in England.
Planning-stage input, fire statements for gateway one and design advice early enough to avoid redesign.
Existing buildings, retrospective fire strategies, remediation design and expert input on as-built problems.
Fire engineer or fire risk assessor: who do you need?
This is the most common confusion in UK fire safety, and the wrong hire wastes money: a fire engineer works on building designs under the Building Regulations, while a fire risk assessor works on existing occupied buildings under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005.
Table: Fire engineer vs fire risk assessor (UK, 2026)
If you are designing, building or altering, or fixing the design of, a building, you need a fire engineer. If you occupy a building and need your ongoing legal fire-safety duty met, you need a fire risk assessor: a different professional, and not the service this site provides.
Fire engineer credentials, explained
Anyone can call themselves a fire consultant; the credentials below are what tell you a UK fire engineer is the real thing. Under the Building Safety Act 2022, anyone carrying out design or building work must have the skills, knowledge, experience and behaviours for the job: a legal duty in Part 2A of the Building Regulations. BS 8670-1:2024 sets the core competence criteria across building-safety roles, with PAS 8671:2022 covering principal designers and PAS 8672:2022 principal contractors; BS 8674:2025 covers fire risk assessors.
CEng (Chartered Engineer): the Engineering Council’s highest registration, demonstrating masters-level knowledge and professional competence, held through a licensed institution.
IEng (Incorporated Engineer), the Engineering Council registration below chartered.
MIFireE / FIFireE: Member or Fellow of the Institution of Fire Engineers (IFE), the professional body for fire engineering. The IFE also runs an opt-in professional directory and a separate Fire Risk Assessors Register.
Engineering Council registration, CEng and IEng status is verifiable free through the Engineering Council’s RegCheck tool. RegCheck is a verification tool, not a browsable list: you need either the registrant’s exact name and date of birth, or their registration number.
A chartered fire engineer, CEng through the IFE or an equivalent institution, is the benchmark authorship for a fire strategy, and effectively essential on higher-risk and engineered projects.
How to choose a fire engineer
Check registration: ask the engineer for their registration number, or their full name and date of birth, and verify their CEng or IEng status free through the Engineering Council’s RegCheck tool. RegCheck cannot be browsed, so you need those details from the engineer. IFE members may also be listed in the IFE’s professional directory.
Match experience to your building: residential blocks (BS 9991:2024), commercial (BS 9999:2017) and engineered designs (BS 7974:2019) are different specialisms. Ask what they have done like yours.
Ask who signs the work, the named engineer authoring your strategy matters more than the firm’s logo.
Get a fixed fee: a defined deliverable (strategy, statement, drawings) should carry a fixed price, not an open hourly meter.
Look for continuity, one engineer from planning (fire statement) through Gateway 2 keeps your documents consistent.
Our network model: honest and named
SustainPlan Ltd is not itself an engineering consultancy: we arrange fire engineering through a network of chartered fire engineers, and we name them. We tell you who is authoring your work before you commit. You get the named professional plus fixed fees and one point of contact.
How it works: our 5-step process
Tell us the project: building type, stage, and the problem (approval, design query, remediation). We match you with a suitable chartered fire engineer and give a fixed-fee quote.
Review, the engineer reviews drawings and constraints against the applicable standard.
Engineering: standard-guidance design or performance-based analysis, as the building requires.
Deliverables: fire strategy, statement, drawings or engineered justification, submission-ready.
Approval support, responses to building control / BSR queries and revisions as the design evolves.
How much does a fire engineer cost?
Fire engineering is quoted per project on a fixed fee wherever the deliverable is defined; open-ended analysis is scoped in stages. The drivers are building complexity, the design route (standard guidance versus a BS 7974:2019 engineered analysis) and the approval support needed, so defined documents can be banded and engineered work cannot.
Table: Fire engineer fee drivers by engagement type (UK, 2026)
The regulation behind it: why now
The Building Safety Act 2022 put competence at the centre of building safety in England. Anyone carrying out design or building work must have the skills, knowledge, experience and behaviours for the job: a legal duty in Part 2A of the Building Regulations, with BS 8670-1:2024 setting the core competence criteria. A higher-risk building cannot start on site until the Building Safety Regulator grants the building control approval application (Gateway 2), which must include the fire and emergency file, the fire strategy, authored to that standard. That is why checking credentials, and engaging an engineer early, matters.
Validity and turnaround
Engineering deliverables stay valid while the design they describe stands; changes mean revisions. Timescales are agreed per engagement.
Fire engineer vs fire strategy consultant
Searching “fire strategy consultant”? Same destination: that page describes the service (consultancy to produce your fire strategy); this page describes the professional (the fire engineer who does the engineering). Both are delivered by the same network of chartered fire engineers on fixed fees.
Our fire strategy services
Fire Strategy · Fire Strategy Report · Fire Strategy Plan · Fire Strategy Drawings · Fire Safety Strategy · Fire Strategy Consultant · Retrospective Fire Strategy · Fire Statement.
Who we work with
Architects, developers, contractors, principal designers, building owners and planning consultants who need a qualified fire engineer on the team: from a single strategy to full-project engineering support.
Why choose us
Named chartered fire engineers, verifiable free through the Engineering Council’s RegCheck tool and listed in the IFE’s professional directory, not a faceless brand.
Fixed fees on defined deliverables.
Whole journey, fire statement to fire strategy to the Gateway 2 building control approval application.
England and Wales.
Areas we cover
Across England and Wales, with particular coverage across Gloucestershire, Bristol, Somerset, Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Greater London and South Wales (Cardiff, Newport, Caerphilly, Swansea, Bridgend, Torfaen). (Links to ALL county hubs.)
Get a fixed-fee quote
Tell us about your project and we will match you with a chartered fire engineer. Send everything through the enquiry form.
Frequently asked questions
What does a fire engineer do?
A fire engineer applies engineering and fire science to building design: working out how a building will behave in a fire and designing the escape routes, compartmentation, detection and firefighting provisions that keep people safe. They author fire strategies and support building control and Building Safety Act approvals.
What is the difference between a fire engineer and a fire risk assessor?
A fire engineer works on building designs (new, altered or being remediated) and produces fire strategies and engineered analyses. A fire risk assessor assesses existing occupied buildings under the Fire Safety Order. If you are designing or building, you need a fire engineer.
What qualifications should a fire engineer have?
Look for CEng (Chartered Engineer) registration with the Engineering Council, typically through the Institution of Fire Engineers (MIFireE), and experience with the standard that applies to your building: BS 9991:2024 for residential, BS 9999:2017 for non-residential, BS 7974:2019 for engineered designs. You can verify CEng or IEng status free through the Engineering Council’s RegCheck tool, using the engineer’s registration number or their full name and date of birth.
How much does a fire engineer cost?
Defined deliverables, a fire strategy, fire statement or set of drawings: are quoted on a fixed fee, driven by the building’s complexity and design route. Open-ended engineering analysis is scoped in stages. Tell us the project for a quote.
When do I need a fire engineer rather than following standard guidance?
When the building does not fit Approved Document B (unusual layout, long travel distances, an atrium, phased evacuation) a fire engineer can justify the design by calculation under BS 7974:2019, supported by the PD 7974 series of technical guidance. A fire engineer is also effectively essential on a higher-risk building whose Gateway 2 building control approval application must include the fire and emergency file.
Is a fire engineering consultant the same as a fire engineer?
Yes, “fire engineering consultant” is simply the consultancy framing of the same professional. Our related page on fire strategy consultancy covers the service itself; this page covers the professional and their credentials.
Can a fire engineer work anywhere in England and Wales?
Yes. Fire engineers work from your drawings, so location is rarely a barrier: site visits are arranged where a survey is needed, for example on retrospective fire strategies. Note that the guidance differs by nation: Approved Document B is England-only, Wales has its own edition, and the Building Safety Act gateways apply in England only, so we write to the regime that governs your site.
Get in touch
Send your drawings, get a fixed fee
Tell us about the building and what stage it has reached. Enquiries arriving in working hours are normally acknowledged the same day, with the fee following once the drawings have been read properly.
- We will tell you plainly if your project does not need one
- Fixed fee confirmed before any work starts
- Building control queries handled as part of the instruction
Everything routes through this form, so your enquiry reaches the engineer rather than a general mailbox.