The National Fire Protection Association has teamed with Chevrolet and OnStar to provide electric-vehicle safety training for first responders.

The collaboration stems from an electric-vehicle safety training initiative NFPA is developing to support the growing number of electric vehicles in the United States. The NFPA initiative, funded by an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant from the U.S. Department of Energy, will include a series of electric vehicle emergency response safety programs available to first responders. The training programs will provide first responders with information they need to most effectively deal with emergency situations involving electric vehicle technology.
NFPA will be reaching out to other auto manufacturers in an effort to include vehicle-specific information in training as more electric vehicles enter the marketplace.

The collaboration includes the co-development of safety resources, including Web-based training materials, vehicle extrication video and shared resources for instructor-led safety presentations. NFPA will be developing training and course curriculum to ensure that first responders know how to respond to incidents involving electric vehicles.

At last week’s Fire-Rescue International, Chevrolet and OnStar hosted a three-hour training session that included a vehicle extrication demonstration featuring the Volt. Experts highlighted key points for first responders, including locations of high-strength steel and cut points for extrication. The extrication demonstration was videotaped and will be made available for reference on the NFPA Electric Vehicle Safety Training Web site.

NFPA is currently developing training materials and course curriculum for the full safety training program. Trainings will be available in the first quarter of 2011. For more information and resources about NFPA’s Electric Vehicle Safety Training, visit www.evsafetytraining.org.