Happy August 11! (and call before you dig): Today is a special day. August 11 – Also known as 8 11 (unless you use the format day/month) What is so special about 811? 8-1-1 is the telephone number that you use to find underground utilities before you dig.
“What do you mean we need to relabel the electrical equipment? Didn’t we just do this a few years ago?” This is a pretty common response when addressing the requirements of NFPA 70E 130.5(2), which necessitate that the arc-flash risk…
Electric shock happens to more people than they care to admit. In almost every NFPA 70E / electrical safety training class that I conduct, I ask the group “how many of you have NEVER experienced an electric shock.” I have…
Wind and Solar Electrical Safety – Rising to the Occasion – A few months ago I was driving home from the Los Angeles area and suddenly found myself surrounded by thousands of wind turbines lining both sides of Interstate 10. Even though I have made this trip many times before, I am still in awe at the scale of it all. Looking through my
The term “working distance” appears 20 times in the 2012 Edition of NFPA 70E, the Standard for Electrical Safety in the Workplace. It appears 12 more times in the annexes. The working distance is an important component of the arc flash hazard analysis and is frequently listed on arc flash warning labels and in the arc flash report. IEEE 1584—IEEE Guide for Performing Arc Flash Hazard Calculations 2002 defines the working distance as “the dimension between the possible arc point and the head
Although beginning with an erratic schedule with revisions to NFPA 70E being spaced anywhere from 2 to 5 years apart, this very important electrical safety standard is now on a regular 3 year revision cycle. In early 2011, I wrote…
How to Perform an Arc Flash Study: What started as a slow drip a decade ago has turned into something more like a tidal wave. I’m not talking about a leaky faucet or a failing dam; I am referring to arc flash studies. Years ago, only a…
In the earlier years of NFPA 70E and the emergence of arc flash protection requirements, many people would use the NFPA 70E Hazard/Risk Tables to determine what arc rated PPE to wear. This approach continues to shift towards the use…
Electrical Power Training and Arc Flash Training remain even more important in a down economy. What if you had been stranded on a deserted island for the past five years? By the time you were rescued, you would have missed the explosion of social media usage, including Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, as well as advancements in smart grids and wind and solar energy—it would be more than you could imagine. You may think, “How could the industry have changed so
One of the first steps in performing an arc flash calculation study is to request short-circuit data from the electric utility company. This kind of request is pretty routine, and utilities have been providing this type of data for short-circuit studies for years. The problem is the data used for a short-circuit study may not be suitable for an arc flash study. Is infinite bus the worst case? Many utilities provide what is known as an “infinite bus” value of
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