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With the drive to net zero pushing emergency services to look closely at their fleets and see what can be done to reduce pollution, the answer isn’t always electric as Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue shows that using alternative fuels can be a major step forward to achieve those all important carbon reductions.
I visited Huntingdon Fire Station to look at one of its new fire engines which is not only fuelled by hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO) but no longer has petrol fuelled kit on board as it has adopted a battery powered approach. HVO is new to me but is a type of bio fuel and when burnt gives off substantially less emissions than diesel and the great thing is that the fire engine can cope with either fuel.
Area Commander Wayne Swales is the brains behind the service’s move to a green fleet. He is deeply committed to the changes and is bringing staff and partners with him as he adopts a collegiate and collaborative approach. He spoke to me about the vision and the delivery.
The change in fuel source – for about 65% of the frontline fire appliances – is one part of Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Services’s sustainability strategy as it seeks to reduce its carbon footprint across the whole organisation. A couple of years ago, the service asked The Carbon Trust to baseline its carbon footprint so that it could work out what a reduction could look like and a plan to get there. He says that there is a perception that being sustainable costs money, “but actually we can do things differently and improve what we do within existing budgets.”
Wayne says that the move to HVO is the best “middle option'”before more is known about fire engines that can use hydrogen or are fully electric where they are both operationally viable and affordable.
The tricky bit about HVO is getting access to it – it’s not on offer at the local BP garage and for now, the service is relying on the county council’s supply as part of a partnership that includes police and others in the county. Wayne said that this partnership was a great way to introduce the fuel change and learn from those further along the road.
The Huntingdon fire engine is special for another reason because it has battery powered kit on it. Firefighters use powerful cutting tools when attending road traffic collisions and they are noisy. The move to battery brings the benefit of no longer needed dirty carbon heavy fuel but a reduction in noise levels that has an impact not only on the crews but the people trapped. No more generators here, as all kit that needed them has moved over to battery and they are recharged as the fire engine goes on its way.
Rethinking operations
The fuel is interesting and important but really it’s the behaviour change that’s significant. Involving crews from day one was really important, says Wayne as the green changes go beyond the fuel source.
I spoke to Ross, a firefighter who is based at Huntingdon. He told me about his trip to Scotland, driving a fire engine all the way to the home of Emergency One, a vehicle converter. He and three other firefighters took all the kit off the SCANIA appliance and showed the E1 staff what works, what doesn’t, what they would like to have and got really into the minutiae that are only known by those who use the vehicle every day.
“A great example of this collaborative approach with E1 is with the water tank. We found that by moving things around there was some ‘dead’ space on the appliance and together with E1 we worked out we could use it to expand the tank capacity from 1800 litres to 2200 litres. It just shows that by our crews spending time with our suppliers, given the time to be inquisitive and work together we can find innovative solutions in all sorts of places.”
Area Commander Wayne Swales.
Reducing exposure to contaminants
A key reason for making the massive trip north was to work out how to get the dirty kit out of the cab and into a separate part of the fire engine to reduce the crew’s exposure to contaminants lingering on their PPE and breathing apparatus (BA).
Firefighter exposure to contaminants and the effect it has on their health is of growing concern. The relentless campaigning by the Fire Brigades Union and its DECON campaign is having an impact as well as the efforts of influencers like John Lord and Robbie Burns who told The Emergency Service Show about ways firefighters can bring attention to their risks through the healthcare system. Anything that can be done to reduce the exposure is to be applauded.
The HVO fire engine has a separate compartment that pulls out to expose the clean hanging BA sets, they no longer rest in the cab with the crew and the dirty sets go straight into separate box at the back. Ross said it takes a bit of getting used to – not having the BA sets in the cab but it’s a marginal change for greater benefit in the long term.
And small things make a difference too. Ross asked E1 to fix a small rack in a free space at the rear of the appliance which holds four boxes of disposable gloves in different sizes so that crews can wear them to remove dirty PPE and BA sets rather than using bare hands.
Future plans
Talking about the future, Wayne explains: “Our goal is to have all of our frontline appliances running on HVO by 2030.” The work has opened up the service to a wider network of organisations in the county who are looking at alternative fuel sources. “We are looking to build a network of HVO ‘drop down points’ where council or fire properties hold HVO that’s accessible to each organisation. This means our crews can fill up with HVO across the county and we can move away from diesel without compromising operational need.”
It means a change of mindset for crews thinking about filling up the appliance and maybe a few more miles here or there, but Wayne is sanguine about this, adding: “We’ll accept it takes a bit more time if we can get that carbon reduction by no longer using diesel.”
I don’t know how many fire and rescue services are taking the HVO approach, but it looks like a pragmatic and low cost solution to move this part of the emergency services closer to a net zero goal. Wayne shows us that it’s not only having an impact on the environment, but is providing new opportunities to work with partners from both public and private sectors to disrupt the way things are always done and that’s got to be a good thing.
