Fighting Fires With Solar Panels

Specifically this study focuses on structural fire fighting in buildings and structures involving solar power systems utilizing solar panels that generate thermal and or electrical energy with a particular focus on solar photovoltaic panels used for electric power generation.

Fighting fires with solar panels.

Solar plays an important role offering an alternative infrastructure of energy generation and distribution that will protect vulnerable communities from different threats of fire and disaster. Lots of pipes and a few thin wires photo 9 indicate a solar hot. Today s solar panels tend to be very strong. Most are designed to withstand large hailstones and high winds.

Dc arc faults are quite simply electrical energy flowing through an air gap which in turn creates an electrical arc. 1 2 courtesy of u s. Combine the dc arc with a combustable material and fire is the result. One of the big misconceptions about solar panels is that they produce electricity nonstop and thus are a major hazard for fire departments dispatched to fight home fires.

The national electric code which is adopted in all 50 states mandates the automatic shutdown of solar inverter. Firefighting is intrinsically dangerous and battling a blaze in a building equipped with solar panels only adds to the list of perils firefighters have to confront. Panels take up needed space on the roof. After all solar panels don t have tail pipes.

The good news is fire departments and homeowners have nothing to worry about in this regard. Paul mcallister a firefighter in rhode island told a local television station that firefighters often attempt to fight fires from outside the building rather than enter the house if there are solar panels on the roof. Unless alternative environmental factors are at play solar panel fires are caused by one thing dc arc faults. Since solar panels are everywhere from home roofs to roadside signs to supermarkets firefighter training is intended to deal with all the challenges that may arrive when fighting fire with solar products involved.