Question: Why does NSW Fire and Rescue regard electric vehicles as special hazards, and what does that mean for strata buildings?
NSW Fire and Rescue currently regards electric vehicles as “special hazards”. How did they reach this conclusion?
Is it compulsory to have a fire installation/certification performed after installing electrical vehicle charging hardware? The current national construction code in the 2025 draft does not mention electric vehicles as special hazards. However, fire sprinklers must be installed in a new building if there are over 40 vehicles present, regardless of their traction type.
Answer: NSW Fire and Rescue currently regard electric vehicles as special hazards, but the Australian Building Codes Board (ACBC) disagrees.
NSW Fire and Rescue currently regards electric vehicles as special hazards. They have this view because EV fires are very low-frequency but high-consequence events. For a point of clarification, there have been 10 EV fires in 14 years in Australia. There are over 10 petrol/diesel vehicle fires per day in Australia. Seven in NSW alone.
However, the ACBC CEO disagrees. Gary Rake, the CEO of the Australian Building Codes Board (ABCB), clarified that the presence of electric vehicles (EVs) and EV chargers in car parks is now considered common enough to no longer be classified as a “special hazard” under the National Construction Code (NCC). This means that the “special hazard” clauses, which typically trigger more stringent safety requirements, should not be invoked solely based on the presence of EVs and their charging infrastructure.
Our understanding is that NSW Fire and Rescue submitted their special hazard request to the ACBC, but this was knocked back on the intended interpretation of special hazard in the NCC 5, which is that the presence of EVs and EV chargers is now common, should not be considered special and therefore is not sufficient to invoke the ‘special hazard’ clauses. We believe NSW new construction and existing strata sites are governed by the NCC and therefore, there are no special hazards considerations. But always good to check with your strata insurer.
This post appears in the July 2025 edition of The NSW Strata Magazine.
Charlie Richardson
NOX Energy
E: charlie.richardson@noxenergy.com.au
P: 0415 513 636
The cost-benefit analysis must also include the diminished value of dwellings where EV charging is not available. Diminished value applies to capital resale value and to recurring rental value – both diminished in competitive property markets. Prospective investors and tenants are under increasing pressure to switch from ICE vehicle ownership to EV ownership.
Retrofitting garage spaces for power needs to suit EV charging is an investment.
Hi Peter
Great point! We agree.
We spoke about some of these points in a webinar I presented with Chris Irons from Strata Solve. We spoke about the emerging dispute flashpoints, covering the increase in price for building with EV charging and how that can be a positive deciding factor for owners to take back to their committee. You can view that part of the discussion here: QLD: Simplifying the approval and dispute process when talking EV charging in strata
Installation of EV charging facilities is a risk/benefit question.
The benefits are likely to be limited to a few individuals until EVs become a better value proposition.
Risk is related to the inherent danger of a high voltage storage system (the EV) and particularly the risk of thermal runaway during charging.
This risk is often dismissed as EV fires are far rarer than ICE fires in general. EVs (including hybrids) are far rarer than ICE vehicles in general (14% of global market in 2023). In both cases fires are most often associated with “refuelling”.
Nobody in their right mind is going to allow refuelling of ICE vehicles in an underground carpark.
EVs burn significantly hotter and longer than ICE vehicles, to the point where structural damage of even concrete building is likely.
Nobody in their right mind should allow “refuelling” of EVs in enclosed garages for the time being until battery safety is improved.
Charging stations in outdoor visitor carparks are the most appropriate solution.
“visitor” should read “dedicated” ie dedicated outdoor spaces, be it a visitor space or another space set aside by the BC for the charging station. Note a publicly accessible charging station may be a commercial opportunity for the BC, provided of course tenants have priority for use of the facility.
Total nonsense, check your insurance policy, you are not covered for the inevitable EV fire, the most dangerous time is during recharging and the fire can not be put out or controlled by fire suppression systems.
I agree. Until the battery tech is changed in these vehicles the fire risk is too great. Good luck trying to put out a burning battery fire in an underground carpark. Thousands of litres of water will be required and it will take hours to extinguish. During that time where do the toxic fumes go ? This is not a matter of if, but when this will happen as more EVs are bought. Let’s hope we don’t have own Grenfell disaster.
Do you really think water would be used on an EV fire?
Timely article. Could you comment on V2G please? In future a >300 apartment block may want to participate in the impending Demand Response market. If 150 EV owners had their vehicles plugged in this represents 9 MWh available to the apartment block and also the grid at peak times. This would be good for the grid, negate the need for apartment blocks to consider batteries, limit upgrades of the Body Corporate (BC) microgrid and a revenue source for EV owners. Embedded Network Managers are permitted to provide financial services so appear to be the logical means of managing not only the present consumption billing but credits due to EV back up and the capital repayments of the EV charging installation (via service fees). This frees the volunteers on the BC committee of funding day to day electricity management. Are there any extra components your proposals need to consider to future proof itself. Assume the regulators will catch up and allow for dynamic price signaling.
Hi Graeme
Mark Jeisman, JET Charge has responded to your question in the article above.
The person or company having the opportunity to quote for the installation of a charging facility for electric vehicles won’t want to quote for a single charging station when he/it may be able to do so for many more vehicles which will only obtain when all or most of the other owners/residents become privy to a by-law needing to be arranged , so instead of seeking a precise quote for just one facility, just ask for a ballpark figure to get a rough idea of the cost for but 1 vehicle, and after (only after, fir$t things fir$t!) having obtained this (quoted) figure, then ask what would be a ballpark figure for an installation that could handle the charging of, say. 1 vehicle for EVERY unit then watch the ear$ prick up on the person who quotes. When you need to borrow just $100 from a friend, if you up the ante $omewhat and ask them to lend you $1,000 instead, you’ll have a much greater chance of easily (r)obtaining just the measly but $100 that you need.