Fight fire with... CNG!

© Czech Gas AssociationApparently CNG can be used to fight fire!

Being based on the Iveco Daily van, the vehicle is arguably quite small for a fire truck and yet it is one. It's just by definition not designed for extinguishing burning buildings – instead, it attends fires related to electrical wiring and appliances. A very specialised vehicle, you might say. Or in fact vehicles, because there are two of them already. Their introduction is the effect of a collaboration between the Fire Service and E.ON. The latter company contributed 50% of the purchase price (or, if you prefer, funded one of the two trucks), i. e. CZK 3 million (128 thousand dollars) out of the initiative's CZK 6 million budget. The vehicles feature CNG tanks capable of holding 34 kg (45,4 m³) of the fuel, which is sufficient for covering approx. 350 km without refueling. Should someone forget to refuel the cars and CNG runs out halfway to the site of fire, no worry – the trucks are bi-fuel ones, so there's always petrol, well, to the rescue.

With the help of E.ON, the fire brigade in Vysocina has the first two emergency vehicles in the country to run on CNG. On behalf of E.ON Distribution, I can say that I am very happy to have the fire department in Jihlava [capital of Vysocina] able to deliver maximum effort and efficiency in extinguishing electrical equipment fires. That was also the reason for our decision to support the purchase – with regard to our already three years of cooperation in the Vysocina project to save energy.

Michael Fehn, executive of E.ON Czech Republic