San Diego, CA | 2017 National Electrical Code Second Draft Meetings | November 9-14, 2015

Discussion on 2017 NEC “Flash Hazard” Proposals [9:51] : Mike Anthony (University of Michigan), David Hittenger (Independent Electrical Contractors), Palmer Hickman (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers)

We will be presented a choice when ballots are due January 15, 2016 on the 2017 National Electrical Code.  Do we:

A. Expand the incident energy labeling requirements in NFPA 70E into NFPA 70 which identify incident energy and PPE levels?

B. Reduce incident energy by up to 80 percent for the majority of education and healthcare campus buildings by changing the NEC and the engineering design and inspection culture to do the following:

• Reducing service and distribution transformer kVA.
• Right-size energy efficient transformers which typically have lower impedance; resulting in higher fault current.
• Zero-sequence current trapping design with 480:480/277V delta-wye transformers; especially for long runs of lighting feeder circuits.
• Resistance grounding; starting with medium voltage campus distribution systems.
• Getting instrumentation that measures real-time incident energy faster to market.  (Recall proposals to NFPA 70B and NFPA 70E committees in previous revision cycles about permitting this instrumentation as an Owner choice. )

Electrical professionals servicing the education facilities industry are welcomed to call in to the November 17th E&H committee teleconference to discuss how our 2017 ballot should be cast.

Other information:

13-9 NFPA 70 National Electrical Code 2017 Revision IEC Issues with proposed revision to 110.16