Noble, 22, was a volunteer firefighter with the Rural Fire Service who lit fires to gain experience in putting them out and had hopes of one day becoming a professional firefighter.

It was the speed with which he appeared at the scene to help extinguish the fires, after alerting authorities to them, that aroused suspicion.

He started small with a grass fire that he lit on the way home after dinner one night at Doyalson RSL Club, along Gorokan Road, Wyee, in 2012.

When he returned to help extinguish it, the fire had doubled in size. Two weeks later he struck at Dyce Road, Wyee, and again a week or so later when he got bored and went for a drive to light another bush fire.

As Noble’s appetite for fires grew he sometimes lit three fires in one day.

In Newcastle Local Court where he was sentenced on Wednesday, defence counsel for Noble, Mandy Hull, said he had expressed genuine sorrow and remorse for his actions and was disappointed with himself for letting the Rural Fire Service down.

The majority of the fires were lit in low-density areas and during the colder months, and were reported to authorities by Noble himself, Ms Hull said.

Magistrate Ian Cheetham said the potential consequences of Noble’s actions were widely known in the community, along with many occasions when lives have been lost, large tracts of land destroyed and volunteers’ lives put at risk to fight fires which were deliberately lit.

The seriousness of his actions were reflected in the legislation which allows for a maximum penalty of 14 years in prison, he said.

There was a suggestion that Noble’s fascination with fires may be a strong one fitting the clinical description of a pyromaniac, but there was a strong need for general deterrence, Magistrate Cheetham said.

He sentenced Noble to two years jail, with a minimum non-parole period of 14 months.

Noble is yet to face the district court on further charges in February 2015.

A YOUNG man who has pleaded guilty to lighting 15 fires will almost certainly face a jail term, Newcastle Local Court has heard.

Alex Gordon Noble, 22, was a volunteer firefighter when he lit a number of fires in south-eastern Lake Macquarie but he did so in low density areas and predominantly during the colder months of the year, the court heard on Wednesday.

Defence counsel for Noble, Mandy Hull, said her client’s motivation, albeit misguided, was to gain experience in putting them out.

The sentence hearing is continuing.