Dive Brief:

• Firefighters face an unusual danger when they have to fight a blaze in any building that has rooftop solar facilities.
• If it's daytime, the system is working and generating current, even if it's been disconnected at a switch below from the interior power.
• Modern firefighting depends on opening ventilation above a fire to let superheated gases and smoke escape so firefighters inside the building can attack the root of the fire and can search for people.

Dive Insight:

The point was painfully made when a 300,000-square-foot refrigerated meat-company warehouse in New Jersey was destroyed by fire recently, and the local chief said that was partly because he would not send his crews onto a roof with 700 solar panels. There's some movement to make sure firefighters know when they're encountering a solar-equipped building, but that doesn't get to the heart of the issue when the sun is creating significant power up there.