The twice-annual battery replacement for smoke detectors will soon be a thing of the past as new rules for smoke detectors were enacted on June 20.

The city of Montreal has altered its bylaw concerning fire safety and will require all homes and apartment buildings built before 1985 be equipped with lithium battery smoke alarms.

These detectors come with batteries that are good for ten years and cannot be removed.

Owners and tenants should test the alarms once a month to ensure they are working, and they will have to be replaced every decade.

Fire departments across Canada say that very often, there are no working smoke detectors in homes where someone is killed after a fire breaks out.

Matthew Griffith of the Montreal Fire Department said that firefighters will periodically inspect buildings to ensure the new bylaw is being followed.

"We will be providing a one-year grace period for owners to change over their old smoke alarms to new ones," he said.