Adam Prudhomme
Editor
A non-toxic solution to fighting fires is gaining traction in markets around the world and Napanee’s FireRein is leading the charge.
Earlier this month they announced a partnership with Markham Fire and Emergency Services (MFES), which will see the city’s fire department transition its entire fire apparatus fleet to FireRein’s signature product, Eco-Gel.
‘The substance is a non-toxic water additive that suppresses both Class A and Class B fires,’ reads a press release issued by MFES. ‘Firefighters will therefore use less water to knock down both regular fires and hydrocarbon fuel fires. The gel suppressant is already in use in several other industries, including wildfire and mining, due to its safety and effectiveness.’
The partnership marks a huge breakthrough for FireRein president and co-founder Quincy Emmons and his team, which operates out of a warehouse on Dairy Avenue with manufacturing taking place in Belleville.
“What we make is water stick,” explained Emmons. “It’s certified 100 per cent plant based, or bio-based, which means plant based. When we mix that concentrate we make a sticky gel.”
Emmons, who has more than 25 years of firefighting experience with Stone Mills Fire Department, first launched the company in 2014. In 2019 he brought in Dr. David Hyndman as chief science officer to refine the product-and despite a slight delay due to the pandemic, the company has since made major strides in the market and is growing exponentially.
“We wanted to improve the concentrate, make the shelf life a little better, make it easier to use for our customers,” said Emmons. “David came in, we worked with him for a couple of years, he optimized the formula. Then we got certification in 2022 with UL (a non-profit testing lab) down in the U.S. It’s worldwide recognition, it’s not just the U.S. We got the paperwork finally done in the middle of 2022. In 2023 we looked at our business model and realized we can’t go fire department to fire department. It’s just too big to do that. So we started recruiting distributers. In the beginning of the third quarter last year we started seeing sales start to pick up. In the fourth quarter they really picked up. We’ve already surpassed last year’s revenues.”
Currently there’s about 20 fire departments using Eco-Gel, including Stone Mills and Loyalist. Markham represents their biggest department to date-and other major metropolitans are taking notice and seeking them out to learn more.
Fire departments are far from their only clients as companies in the rail sector, industrial mining and auto recycling also have Eco-Gel on hand to prevent major damage in the event of fire.
While it’s firefighting effectiveness is a major selling point, just as important is the fact it can extinguish fire in a much more environmentally responsible fashion compared to traditional methods.
“What we’re replacing is the firefighting foams,” said Emmons. “It’s known now that (foams) carry forever chemicals PFAS chemicals and the new PFAS free foams still have these chemicals in them or they have other chemicals that are not as popular in main stream media yet but the National Research Council of Canada did a report that they could be even more toxic than what they’re replacing. We believe the foam of the future’s not a foam, it’s a gel. The ability to stick and stay is more effective.”
Eco-Gel’s compatibility with standard firefighting equipment allows for it to be easily implemented in place of what most departments are currently using-while eliminating harmful chemicals for the firefighters.
“Our product is for firefighting, but also for wildfires,” said Emmons. “So that red retardant that you see coming down (in current wildfire fighting methods), although different provinces say they use different products, they’re all made by the same company. In North America it’s pretty well a monopoly. Some of the customers realize that product is toxic.”
Working with the Canadian military, FireRein is pushing the Canadian government to re-think their response to wildfires.
“Our product can be dropped on (a wildfire) or used ahead within a day or so, depending on the thickness that you put on,” said Emmons. “It just allows more options for firefighters while being plant based.”
With 2024 already off to a booming start, big things are on the horizon with plans to expand their operations all around the globe. All while based in Napanee.
“There’s some advantages to being in Napanee,” said Emmons. “We’re two-and-half hours to Toronto, two-and-half hours to Montreal, two hours to Ottawa. We’re pretty nimble, we can go all over the place like that.”
To learn more about FireRein, visit www.firerein.com.