Lt. Chris Freeman from Passaic (NJ) Fire Department sent in these photos of something we will all probably start to see a bit more, roof mounted solar panels. As you can see in the photo above, the entire surface of the roof is covered with these panels. This could cause a few issues for us when operating in and around these structures. So since we knew nothing about solar power, we did some research. We are not experts in solar energy, but we found some information that is definitely worth sharing.
Click here for the supplemental page with more information.
40 thoughts on “Goin’ Green”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
well the little “mini-porch” isn’t safe either as means of an egress. There is even a low hanging wire in front of the house, just a nightmare all around.. Especially on one of them 2 AM working fire calls. Im sure that inside there are lots of angled rooms, and high ceilings too.. lol got to love innovation.
wires, i just noticed that the power line going to the A & B corner is low in front of the neighboring residence.. very very nice
I was going to suggest PPA and stay off the roof completely….till I saw the balloon frame construction.
Not sure if some of you southern guys/gals will relate to the issue of snow load…..but factor in these panels being installed in a snow belt area…on a leeward sloping roof and you might be in for abit of a late night surprise when going to the roof.
This house has panels facing the roadway…easy to notice during the warmer months. I know there are a few houses close to mine which have the panels on the opposite side of the house as the road…hence you’d never notice they had panels unless you had access to their backyard. As I mentioned earlier throw about 2 feet of drifted snow on top and you’d never know they were there…until you were on top of them with a saw.
Just came across the “The Impact of Solar Energ on Firefighting” article in Jan 09 Fire Engineering (pg 79).
Add in an increased dead load on the roof during fire conditions….as well as an inhalation hazard if the panels are broken/cut….makes discussions like these that more important.
Apparently IFSTA has added PV’s (photovoltaics) in it’s Fireground Support Ops Manual….just as an fyi.
Been a while for me so here I go. Number 1-There are enough windows in the third floor of this place, why the eff would you need to go on the roof. What are you going to accomplish on the roof, venting the 3 foot attic space? Which is usually the case. Im sorry but I am just anti-roof-going. In most cases its just unnessecary and done for sport. Number 2-I became a ff to protect life, property, and the enviroment. Now the lives we save come back and sue us. The property is being made to collapse and injure us. And NOW the f’ing enviroment is putting it to us! Seriously, what the hell are we thinking?? Dont get me wrong I understand the reason for this post but there’s a comments section and by jukey Im gonna use it!
Insert pro-roof, truss roof, venting comments here….
Another thing to consider…many times there are large “battery banks” used to store excess power to supply the house at night time or on days when not enough energy is produced. These banks are often times in the basement.
They can weigh as much as a car and obviously create a huge hazard, both electrically and in terms of a HAZMAT incident. They SHOULD have their own cut-off switch to take them off of the system.
Stepping on these at night or in snow should not be an issue if you’re sounding the roof as you go. You would definitely break some glass, which would really get your attention.
I have to agree with Dman72 on the horizontal vent option. Our department has been hit by cuts and my crew has talked about doing more horizontal venting and not worrying too much about the roof. Most residental structures don’t need the roof opened. These panels just make it an even better option, at least until we know more about them and how to work with them.
preplan, study, and drill on buildings in your area. And if your not sure if its a solar panel roof or not, because its new to the building, or its dark, or we are outside of our normal area, or we are too busy watching “Rescue Me”, then check the roof just like any firefighter worth his weight would do. and if you Don’t have enough guys to send someone to the roof, call another company.
think beyond this particular ballon frame construction….I’m guessing this article was to create discussion on solar panels in general…on all types of residential buildings. You may not jump to the roof on this one, but many depts would if the construction was slightly different.
For horizontal venting….PPA and balloon construction aren’t the ideal combo. Which brings up the idea that you need to be proficient and fully understand when/where to use diff venting practics….if your choice is going to be PPA for this one…PLEASE don’t tell me your plan is to keep the exhaust opening smaller than the intake to “allow the house to pressurize”.
forget the roof, what about that door on the second floor?
Great topic guys! Not to beat my own drum, but this months FE has an article I wrote on just this topic. This is a very important area we all need to be familiar with. I would just like to say that while this DOES affect our roof ops, do not think you can just bash through these to make your hole. Look elsewhere for a place to vent.
Be Safe Brothers!
Something else you may think about, have these residents told their neighbors (2-3 doors down even) about the “Positive aspects” of the PV’s and do the neighbors have any? And that could lead to an exposure problem, considering these houses are what, 20 feet apart, at most! That fire could jump to the next house and then you’d have 2 working fires, BOTH with solar roofs!! Just food for thought…
First I want to thank Vent Enter Search for the great research on this topic as well as the comments posted here. To Dman72 I agree with you 1000% horizontal vent all the way on this one and Firefighter Life safety was the purpose of this post. This is the 1 and only house in our small city with these panels so far. The house is a converted 2.5 story frame and city inspectors being what they are, we were told nothing of what was being put in. As you can see the house presents a number of issues and was found due to very alert company officers who picked up on this while out checking on their district. When this was passed on to me my concern was not for operatng on the panels but like metioned, once the winter comes and the snow and ice build up and it’s 2 in the morning, how forgiving will this roof be and as we lerarned the answer is it’s not, no room for error here. I hope the info here helps some other brothers and this is what happens when company’s find a hazard and share it with as many people as possible because there is not a single firefighter in our department that can say they didn’t know it was there. Keep your eye’s open and IF YOU SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING, the more we know the safer we are.
Stay Safe
WHEN THE ROOF BURNS AWAY WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE POSSIBILITY OF THESE PANELS SLIDING OFF THE ROOF LIKE A SHEET OF GLASS INTO THE FRONT YARD.
Chris F., how accessible are all sides of this house with portable ladders and an aerial for horizontal venting?
The house doesn’t have much space on the B/C side and I see some power lines and a honking big tree in the C/D side.
To the previous poster (DMAN72)with the comment similar to “the enviro is now putting it to us”…I have to respectfully disagree. Technology isn’t putting it to us…we been putting it to ourselves for many years by not doing what we are doing now….looking at building related issues and finding solutions before we need to. It’s not their responsibility for our safety…it’s ours.
kingme- they won’t slide off the roof, but will – as you east coast guys like to say…”be in the basement”. They are lagged to the rafters, so if the lags come out, it’s because the rafters are burnt through, then the weight will drop them into the structure.
What we are striving to establish on the West Coast is a set of installation guidelines that gives us a 3′ setback along the edges for getting up and down off the roof. If you are on the north side venting, and have to get off PDQ, this array leaves no option of egress on the South side. That is my concern with this system.
As far as snow loading or obscuring the array, the conduit, disconnect and labeling MUST help us identify the presence of a PV system. This makes the “Hot Lap” all that more important before anyone goes topside.
Gents,
A member of our FOOLS Chapter (Justin Reynolds, Chicago Truck 15) read an article on this topic on Firefighterclosecalls.com and found the information questionable. He did some additional research and presented an excellent training program at one of our meetings. You can cut and paste the link below to find the original article from Firefighterclosecalls and Justin’s article.
http://www.southsidefools.com/Microsoft Word – Solar Panels.pdf
As this becomes more prevalent, we need to learn the basics and seek additional information. I have found that there is very little good info out there. Hope this helps. Thanks to Brother Justin.
Sorry, that link didn’t work, try this one.
http://www.southsidefools.com/Microsoft Word – Solar Panels.pdf
3rd time is a charm….
http://www.southsidefools.com/Microsoft%20Word%20-%20Solar%20Panels.pdf
It’s great to see that we are going out and learning about PV systems. A good write-up from a fellow trucker makes me proud!
http://fireengineering.com/display_article/361518/25/none/none/Feat/Solar-Electric-Systems-and-Firefighter-Safety
PFD023,
This is actually good access compared to the rest of our city. There would be no problem with getting ground ladders in position at the B/C corner, D-side and the rear for both vent and secondary egress. As for the aerial there is enough room for a good Tower Ladder Chauffer to get the bucket in position. I know the next comment is what about the wires at the A/B corner, however given the low location of the storm head and the set back of the building this would be a safe operation for the top floor windows.
PFD023,
It was a joke, Dude. A joke. HAHA style.
Have a CD on Photo victolic class
Tisk tisk Daman,,,, how dare you not think we all belong running the ridge cutting holes like a bunch of monkeys !!!! God I hate people that think vertical vent is the only way to go!!! Kingme,,, I pray you are an engine guy you will be safe at the knob I would hate to think you may be struck by a falling panel being a yard breather jeeeezzzzzzz!!!
didn’t anyone recognize the door on the second floor leading to you or your brothers death! Let’s make sure we don’t lose our focus. Panels on the roof….daytime cover them and secure both panels, night time..secure the panels. Increased dead load..stay off if concern for compromise! otherwise get to work and recognize items that will surely kill an interior guy!!!!!!!!!!
L13 you sound like one of them big city fellas, real salty, seen it all and just put the wet stuff on the red stuff and go home. I guess if you would have read the prior post’s you would have seen that there were a few items of concern addressed by our brothers here. Next if you would have checked the topic of the article it’s from building construction and outside functions so the focus my friend is through your narrow eye’s. For some people out there they like to share new challanges out there in communities so we can all learn from them, that is what makes this site so good. So Mr. interior guy why you look for the very obvious door that leads to a small roof(the same one that all of us saw from a good size up) The rest of us will look for the next thing that will kill a firefighter.
ARE WE GETTING OFF TOPIC AGAIN???? JESUS. “NEXT THING THAT WILL KILL A FIREFIGHTER.” I HAVE 2 WORDS…HEART ATTACKS AND VEHICLE ACCIDENTS ARE WHAT KILLS FIREFIGHTERS, NOT USUALLY STUFF LIKE THIS. OK THAT’S LIKE 5 WORDS OR WHATEVER. THE POINT IS STUFF LIKE THIS CAN INJURE OR KILL PEOPLE. SO READ THE POST AND SAY “OH I DIDNT KNOW THAT” AND CLICK OVER TO SOMETHING ELSE. I GOTTA BELIEVE A LOT OF THESE COMMENTS ARE INSIDE JOKES, CUZ’ I CANT BELIEVE THAT WE ARE THIS NIT-PICKY. OH WAIT….FIREMEN….YES I CAN.
Nice find Lt. In my section of NJ we have these things popping up all over the place, so much so that some of the local FD’s have had some “experts” come in and do these one night type of class on the effects of solar panels during firefighting operations. These can be very difficult to notice at a quick glance, especially being black in color like some of them are, you may never distinguish it from the everyday asphalt shingling. and the comments above about the snow definately apply.
The interesting thing about these classes that were held was that later, after the classes were over, the NJDFS commented on the fact that these “experts” were not exactly the people that should be used to teach this type of information to FD’s and to be leary of the information gained. I didn’t attend any of these training courses so I can’t really say good or bad about them since i have nothing to base it on but just beware of any classes that might be offered in your areas. It is always worth doing some thorough backround investigating into outside agencies/people presenting a class so the information passed onto us doesn’t lead to a false sense of security when faced with a fire where these panels may be present.
In florida area they use these to heat pools….
Did anyone notice the door on the second floor. If that door would have to be used as an egress look where it leads to?
It might be helpful to examine other ways that we could access the same attic space by different means to accomplish ventilation. Gable cuts can be made from the comparatively safer position of a ladder, allowing us to vent the same space without the necessity of setting foot on the solar panels.
LT., great post. This would be great to pass onto your neighbors who respond into your city for mutual aid.
wo wo dont forget sounding the roof and breaking the glass can follow with the shock of your life!!! be a little more careful then that.
Why so angry? It is just good information, nothing more than that…so,thanks for bringing it to our attention and thanks for the constructive comments. Yes, I see the door to nowhere.
There is great article in this month’s “Home Power” magazine (print edition )- (Issue #131 (Jun/Jul ’09)) that is very informative regarding PV solar roof installations….and the associated dangers we face when we encounter them. Roof size-up (recognition), continued electrical generation (even with grid power loss), excess weight, etc., etc. – check it out
http://www.homepower.com/current/
Also – PV Solar Electric panels are different than Solar Hot Water generation panels – to the uneducated or uninformed they can look to be the same though
Contributor “Matt May” actually supplied the same authored article as described in my last post previously above too – nice of me to notice!
Anyways – “Home Power” can also supply lots of info for those needing more information regarding how PV solar panels differ from solar hot water panels….
irish jake, Actually it’s just “Matt” but thanks for the credit. A better article for us FF’s is the one I wrote in the current issue of Fire Engineering. We all should have a specialty and this just happens to be mine.
It took a while to get this back but I have a relative in San Fran who is a mechanical engineer working on solar installations. Here is is opinion on how his industry is looking at ours:
“Good stuff. Glad the discussions are starting to happen. Unfortunately I think the firefighters are a few steps behind and need to catch up fast.
One of the comments refers to this site that’s a good start:
http://fireengineering.com/display_article/361518/25/none/none/Feat/Solar-Electric-Systems-and-Firefighter-Safety
both the firefighters and the solar industry (solar electricity – PV much more than solar thermal – solar hot water heating) are going to have to make some concessions to make future systems as safe as can be. But I don’t think a lot will happen until the firefighters come up to speed and put some well thought out demands/requirements on the table. There’s a lot of money in the solar industry and it’s starting to take off and the later the requirements are put up for discussion the harder it’s going to be to get them accepted in the solar industry.”