Fire risk from solar panels

I was speaking to Trevor Vandenberg the other day and he mentioned a potential fire risk with solar panels that he has noticed in the Cove.

Trevor does lots of roof cleaning, blowing off leaves and sticks from roofs in North Arm Cove and other places.

He has noticed that there can be a big build up of leaves and sticks underneath solar panels. He has tried to blow them away but frequently they won’t dislodge, being a mass of sticks and leaves pushed together by rain and wind. To make matters worse, they can’t be dislodged using long sticks or poles because of the electrical wires and connections underneath that join the solar panels.

This could be a major fire risk – if there is a fire nearby and embers fall on your roof they could cause the debris under the solar panels to catch on fire with disastrous consequences.

So what can you do about minimising this risk – two suggestions to consider:

1. Have the leaves and sticks on your roof blown off regularly so it doesn’t build up, or
2. Even better, have some fireproof ember gutter guard placed around the top and edges  of your solar panels so leaves and sticks can’t get underneath.