Pacific Bioenergy Corporation (PacBio) announced that the Prince George Fire Department responded to a call at its facility on Willow Cale Road (9900 block) on Monday following an incident in an exterior conveyor system.
PacBio CEO John Stirling issued this statement in a news release:
“We are very thankful that none of our employees or members of the PGFD team were injured during and while responding to the incident. Our emergency response training paid off as our employees contacted PGFD immediately following the incident.”
“PGFD remained onsite for a few hours to extinguish smoulders. We were cleared by PGFD at approximately 8:00 p.m. to begin receiving fibre deliveries to the plant. The incident is under investigation by our staff and WorkSafeBC. The investigation is expected to take several days to complete. We will make the necessary repairs to the plant and resume production of wood pellets as soon as it is safe to proceed.”
According to fire crews, the wood pellet manufacturing facility sustained $50,000 worth of damage.
Firefighters quickly applied water to several conveyors which had smouldering wood material inside.
No injuries were reported.