Dr Greg Penney’s research recognised with national awards

CRC associate student Dr Greg Penney has received the Ron Coffey Award for Excellence in Bushfire Protection from Fire Protection Association Australia for his PhD research into operational effectiveness and firefighter safety during wildfire suppression.

Dr Penney was awarded the Ron Coffey Award for excelling the award criteria, which included:

• evidence of a high level of technical achievement in the bushfire protection industry
• the ability to develop innovative solutions to overcome complex bushfire protection issues
• ongoing professional development and training
• engagement with key stakeholders to achieve positive outcomes that improve community safety.

He won the award at the Fire Australia 2021 Conference and Awards Dinner, which was held in May 2021 in Sydney, celebrating the best in fire protection and raising money for the Fiona Wood Foundation. 

Dr Penney is a Superintendent with the Department of Fire and Emergency Services in Western Australia and completed his PhD, Through the flames - quantitative analysis of strategic and tactical wildfire suppression, with Edith Cowan University in October 2020. Earlier this year, he was also awarded the Australian Institute of Health and Safety’s National Eric Wigglesworth Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Education Medal.

The CRC congratulates Dr Penney on these well-earned achievements.

Based on his PhD findings, Dr Penney wrote a handbook incorporating lessons he had learnt on fire engineering and building design. A Handbook of Wildfire Engineering: Guidance for Wildfire Suppression and Resilient Urban Design was published in October 2020 through the CRC as a free download. The handbook was written to promote the emerging field of wildfire engineering and provide practical guidance to firefighters, incident management teams and urban planners in order to improve fire suppression operations, firefighter safety and resilient community design at the rural urban interface. Chapter topics include wildfire fuels and behaviour modelling, wildfire suppression practices, firefighter tenability, critical water flow rates, protection systems, and risk management.