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CONTACT US


Phone: +61 (0)7 3077 6770

Fax: +61 (0)7 3077 6769

Email: enquiry@staceyagnew.com

Address: Unit 4, 35 Limestone Street,

Darra, Queensland 4076, Australia

QAFI Electrical Fire Workshop

Dr Nick Agnew recently attended a workshop on electrical fires, hosted by the Queensland Association of Fire Investigators (QAFI).  The workshop included a live “burn” at the QAFI Whyte Island training facility involving various residential electrical products, a full scale room burn, and mock arson situations.

One of the “hot” topics of the day was fire hazards associated with Photovoltaic (PV) solar panel installations.  Being medium voltage DC systems of typically between 120 and 400 volts, these installations can be hazardous if not installed correctly or to a quality standard.  A few of the key PV learnings were:

  • DC arcing faults present a much worse hazard than AC faults of similar voltage and power and so AC-rated switches or protection equipment are not appropriate
  • The main types of hazardous situations are parallel faults across the negative and positive array terminals, series arcs due to poor system connections, and earth faults
  • PV fires have occurred in Australia and abroad but are rare events
  • Areas to watch are panel build quality, leaf build-up under connectors and panels, and quality of connectors, switches, and circuit breakers
  • The rate of growth in the uptake of PV technology in the residential market will be a challenge for regulators, licensing authorities, and standards groups

 

 

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