You, your friends, colleagues, and all interested people are cordially invited to attend a webinar entitled: Enhancing safety and reducing fire risk in residential and commercial solar PV and BES systems.
Date: Monday, 13 April 2026.
Time: 14h00 to 16h40.
Platform: Zoom Webinar 1000. Cost: Free-of-charge, all welcome.
Hosted by: EE Business Intelligence
Supported by: SABS, Eksteen & Le Roux Electrical Engineers, Electrical Contractors Association, Herholdt’s Group, GoSolr and Huawei Digital Power
Register to attend the webinar here
Presenters
- Opening: Andre van der Elst, Eksteen & Le Roux Engineers; Convenor of SABS 10142-1 Working Group.
- Presenter 1: Anthony Schewitz, Regional Director (Highveld), Electrical Contractors Association.
- Presenter 2: Hein Herholdt, CEO, Herholdt’s Group.
- Presenter 3: Andrew Middleton, CEO, GoSolr.
- Presenter 4: Shane Marcelo Prins, Chief Solutions Architect, Huawei Digital Power Sub-Saharan Africa
- Wrap-up: Leon Roos, Consultant: Compliance and Safety; Member of SABS 10142-1 Working Group.
Synopsis
As rooftop solar PV and battery energy storage (BES) systems proliferate across residential and commercial premises, safety and fire-risk mitigation have never been more critical. Join EE Business Intelligence for an expert-led webinar that tackles the latest strategies, technologies and best practice for improving system safety and reducing fire incidents on customer sites.
Register to attend the webinar here
Key topics covered
- Power Optimizers fitted to solar PV modules: How power optimizers maximise power output under partial shade conditions, and reduce PV array voltages to close to zero when the inverter shuts down, ensuring the rooftop is safe for maintenance personnel and firefighters under emergency conditions.
- DC arc fault detection and circuit interruption: How inverters with advanced DC arc-fault detection and circuit interruption (AFCI) capabilities significantly reduce fire risk by identifying and isolating dangerous, high-temperature, DC arcs in less than a second.
- BESS placement: Best practice in respect of positioning of BES systems on premises to minimise exposure to direct sunlight, facilitate adequate ventilation, minimise fire risk and enable safe maintenance.
- Battery cell quality control and monitoring: Tight cell quality control and oversight, and real-time monitoring to detect early degradation or fault conditions within battery packs.
- Integrated fire detection and suppression: Emerging technologies in lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery packs that embed internal smoke/heat detection and onboard chemical fire suppression to arrest thermal runaway events and fires at source.
- Regulatory and installer perspectives: How laws, regulations, codes, standards, specifications and installer practices must evolve in tandem with the rapid uptake of PV + BES systems and technology advances.
Why attend?
With growing number of installations of behind-the-meter solar PV and BES systems, stakeholders – from portfolio developers, EPCs and installers, to regulators, standards bodies, insurers and customers – must understand the emerging safety challenges and solutions associated with solar PV and BES systems.
This webinar brings together international and local experts to explore practical, deployable, risk-mitigation techniques that can save lives, protect assets and build confidence in distributed energy systems.
Format
This will be a 2½ hour webinar conducted on the Zoom Webinar 1000 platform. After a 15-minute opening address to contextualise the webinar, four expert presenters will each have 20-minute slots to present on various aspects of the subject of the webinar, followed by a 15-minute wrap-up and a 30-minute open discussion and Q & A session.
Programme
14h00 – 14h05: Welcome and housekeeping: Chris Yelland, EE Business Intelligence.
14h05 – 14h20: Opening address: Andre van der Elst, Convenor of SANS 10142-1 Work Group.
14h20 – 14h40: Presenter 1: Anthony Schewitz, Contractors Association.
14h40 – 15h00: Presenter 2: Heine Herholdt, Herholdt’s Group.
15h00 – 15h10: Comfort break
15h10 – 15h30: Presenter 3: Andrew Middleton, GoSolr.
15h30 – 15h50: Presenter 4: Shane Marcelo Prins, Huawei Digital Power Sub-Saharan Africa
15h50 – 16h05: Wrap up and key takeaways: Leon Roos, Member of SANS 10142-1 Work Group.
16h05 – 16h35: Q & A session: Moderated by Chris Yelland.
16h35 – 16h40: Thanks and closure: Chris Yelland.
