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Firefighter Training Goes Green In Denver

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Jul 6, 2009 9:12 pm US/Mountain

Firefighter Training Goes Green In Denver

Written by Environmental Specialist Paul Day

Reporting
Paul Day

DENVER (CBS4) ―

Click to enlarge 1 of 2: The smoke is non-toxic, theatrical smoke. The flames are controlled by computer and the system generates intense heat.
CBS
Click to enlarge 2 of 2: CBS4's Project Green looks at how Coloradans are living in environmentally friendly ways. Visit the Project Green section.

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There used to be no way to avoid creating toxic smoke and contaminated water at firefighter training centers, but not anymore.

"We'd have all sorts of black toxic materials going up in the air. You can see here we're burning a propane fire; nice clean burn," said Lt. Bill Miller.

Miller works for North Metro Fire, which is in its first summer of operating a new 14-acre Training Center committed to being "green."

"We knew the restrictions environmentally were getting tougher and tougher, plus we wanted to be a good neighbor," said Wendy Forbes, Public Information Officer for North Metro.

The center is located in Weld County on a slice of land owned by the City of Northglenn.

Visitors notice plenty of flame, but the fire is really fake because nothing burns up -- no junk cars, no piles of scrap wood, and certainly no tires. Instead, it's a new school of thought with clean-burning propane and props. The smoke is non-toxic, theatrical smoke. The flames are controlled by computer and the system generates intense heat.

"The hallway fire puts fire across the ceiling so they can feel the heat and it gets very hot -- up to 500 or 600 degrees," explained Dan Frey, North Metro Training Officer.

The water used to put out the fires has an oily sheen, but Forbes says there is minimal contamination in contrast to water coming off fires at traditional fire training centers. All the water at North Metro is collected in a retention pond where more than half of it is recycled for training purposes.

Simulated fires are surprisingly realistic, according to veteran firefighters at North Metro, but some things are missing.

"We don't quite get the steam generation you would get with a real Class A fire," said Miller.

North Metro built the facility with $16 million raised in a bond election passed by voters 3 years ago. It's the first "green" fire training facility in the state, according to Forbes. She says the closest thing like it is in Texas or California.

North Metro used to train somewhere else, but by being the first department in the state to build an environmentally-friendly fire training facility, other departments are now showing interest in training at North Metro's Center.

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