Firefighter who slashed station costs by €50,000 gets Green award

Also in Irish

By Treacy Hogan Environment Correspondent

Saturday April 16 2011

A FIREFIGHTER has been honoured for creating the world's first zero-carbon fire station.

Neil McCabe picked up a coveted Green Award for his plan which is now saving Dublin City Fire Brigade €50,000 a year through lower energy and fuel bills.

Fire tenders at Kilbarrack fire station now use water collected through a rainwater harvesting system, reducing their water consumption by 14,000 litres a week, while the fire engines now run on a diesel/biofuel mix.

The project has seen a reduction of 80pc in energy consumption at the station, after it was retrofitted with sustainably sourced material, and its heating system replaced with new energy efficient boilers.

Innovation

The entire plan was drawn up and overseen by Mr McCAbe, who kept working his normal shift hours as a firefighter.

Aviva Stadium, Intel, Bank of Ireland were also among the winners in this year's Green Awards, sponsored by the Irish Independent and Greenstar, Ireland's largest recycling and waste resource firm.

Jerry Dempsey, Greenstar divisional managing director, said the high level of awards showed how far Ireland had come in developing innovative green solutions.

Other sponsors include RealEyes, Ecocem, Am�rach Research, Greenbusiness.ie, Construct Ireland, Deloitte, rx3, the National Transport Authority, Airtricity and Accenture.

Environment Minister Phil Hogan was the guest of honour at the event.

Winners:

Best Green Product: Ecocem

Green Small-to-Medium sized enterprise of the year: Croke Park

Green Entrepreneur: Ann Butterly

Green Community: Coolagown Development Group

Greenest County Council: Dublin City Council

Green Professional Services: Deloitte

Green Financial Institution: Bank of Ireland

Green Corporate Citizenship: Intel

Green School/College: University College Cork

Green Large Manufacturer: Pfizer