Gas Pipe Bonding Requirements

[Music] this is a big question gas piping bonding requirements what do you have to do oh my god it's not perfect there okay perfect ready for this hey mike what are the nec requirements for bonding of gas piping systems oh this is so easy you're not going to believe it all right let's understand the concept let's understand the theory okay and that is in 250 that 4 a4 says this normally non-carrying carrying electrically conductive materials likely to become energized now what does that mean by likely become energized according to the nfpa nac code style manual likely to become energized means that there's actually conductors there an example if you have a box and you put conductors electrical conductors of course in a box and you take that box and you mount it on something then whatever you monitor it on is likely to become energized so if you have a fence let's just pick a stupid example but it's the best i can think of you if the fence was the fence like to become energized no it's not but if for some reason you ran electrical circuit out there and you decided i'm going to take this box and i'm going to mount it on on a post of the fence well then guess what that fence now is likely to become energized so let's review this if you don't take any electrical circuitry to something then that something is not likely to become energized okay let's go back again normally non-carrying carrying electrically conductive materials likely become energized what does that mean that means you ran a circuit to it so let's take a look here well this transformer is likely to become energized this panel is likely to become energized this steel column is likely to become energized um this gas piping is not likely to become energized because i don't see any electricity so this gas piping is not likely to become energized not this one now if i had a fireplace and if in the fireplace i had a switch that i'm turning on let's say some fan or maybe there's other things in fireplaces today who knows what it is maybe there's internet access on a fireplace okay okay my mouse is moving here let me see if i can stop it from moving um so if you had a fireplace and you have electric to the fireplace well then guess what that gas piping is likely to become energized if you have a this gas pipe in this compressed air connected to some piece of equipment and that's all metal well that's likely become energized so now we know what's likely to become energized so this gas piping here is not like to become energized so the code doesn't apply to this but everything else we've seen here is oh by the way this this duct work later on you'll see is not metal ducting is not required to be bonded so normally non-carrying carrying electric conductive materials likely become energized must be but connected i say bonded it says codes is connected to an effective groundfall current path which actually connects it's probably even a better word than bond but you don't want body is not too bad and it says in accordance with 250.104. so this is just a general statement telling you what to do so the question was about gas piping and i and i get this all the time particularly corrugated stainless steel tubing csst gas piping might they want me to bond it what are the code requirements ready for this now in this case here is this gas piping likely to become energized well yeah because you ran an electrical circuit to it and you since you had power to this furnace now you have conductors in that enclosure so the non-current carrying conductive part of this metal furnace is likely to become energized so what do you have to do well i says well then you're going to have to bond it in accord with 250.104. so now what does 2o5104 says he says listen the gas metal piping in or attach to a building is considered bonded by the circuit equipment grounding conductor hold on mike what are you telling me well here so you got to realize that emt is considered an equipment grounding conductor and depending upon the rating of the flex in this particular case here more than likely brian what do you think that probably a 15 amp circuit is probably run there and this is probably not more than six feet exactly right well if that's the case well then that flex metal conduit is considered part of the effective ground fall current bath which means that this furnace and the gas piping connected to the furnace is actually connected to the equipment grounding conductor which means it's what it's bonded and according to 250 that 4 a 4 says go to 250 that 104 250 104 b says any metal piping not talking about water piping because that's 250.104 but other metal piping systems enter attachment building is considered bonded by the circuit equipment grounding conductor no additional bonding is required by the nec you're done that's it there you go that's how you handle gas bonding brian you said something yeah mike we have a quick comment actually i'm going to go back to your um if you could go back to the one with the water heater i've got a comment from michael and he says um isn't there continuity of the gas piping to the water heater and shouldn't we just bond both gas and water heater what you mean about the water piping here he's asking specifically about i think about the gas piping because you said there was no not wasn't likely to become energized that so i don't think it was clear that there was no electrical circuit going to the water heater i believe is where the confusion is well if we if we take a if we take a look at this gas piping it's going to a gas we need to put a note here mike corbett make this word gas water pipe i mean i'm sorry um yeah well a gas water piping so so therefore there's there's no electric so am i as i'm missing something here what does somebody want to do okay so since this is a gas water pipe but watch this i'm sorry what am i saying water but if this is a gas water heater so it this pipe is not required to be bonded brian do you agree with that yep 100 but what about if it was electric whole different ball game well if it was electric is required to be bonded but it's automatically bonded because you have to bring an equipment ground and conductor to the equipment in the first place so there's nothing to do no matter how you do it there's nothing to do okay that's it that's the answer but mike the inspector everybody's saying i gotta do this okay they have been attempting to get this in a code to change this requirement since 2008 and the nec says look this is gas piping systems this is not within the scope of the nec so what they did do they said okay tell you what we're going to do we're going to put an informational note in 250.104b and we'll just say something right here's what it says hey the national fuel code nfpa 54 section 7.13 contains further information about bonding gas piping guess what i don't care what the fuel code is you know why that's a mechanical code i think that's the mechanical i think it's in the mechanical code whoever gets licensed and whoever takes a test and they have to bring their nfpa 54 not nfpa 70 to take their test and their license and they do whatever they want to do they can do whatever they want to do in 250 i'm sorry an nfpa 54. that has nothing to do with the electrician okay but mike you don't understand man they give us all kinds of crap and they say we're supposed to do it you know what the table is going to do let's go to nfpa 54. let's find out what it says at least that you know what it says not that you're responsible for it but if you decide you know mike is easier for me i just want to do it i'm like okay fine you want to do it then go to 54. and here's what it says now this is like a like a little summary of what it says 7.13 dot says this gas piping system shall be bonded to the grounded service conductor the grounding electroconductor or the grounding electrode with a 6 gauge wire copper run not longer than 75 feet and they say you're supposed to do it in accordance with the nec and i'm like what are you guys talking about in 54 we don't have to do anything with your gas piping system so don't be telling them to do it in accordance with the nec because we don't know what you act you want us to do so it's kind of like yeah whatever okay so six gauge wire not more than 75 feet long copper conductor and then it goes on it says also 7.13.2.1 the bonding connection shall be with a fitting listed for the purpose in other words they have to actually make a fitting specifically for the gas pipe bonding specifically listed for that purpose and you have to connect that fitting to rigid metal pipe or to the css fitting and that connection has to be accessible okay there's the rules so now let's take a look at this here is the css of course you can't bond the actual corrugated stainless steel tubing so you could put a bonding fitting listed specifically for a css fitting actually listed for that actual fitting you can put it right on that fitting or you can put it for a fitting listed to terminate on the gas pipe specifically listen for that purpose copper conductor six skates not more than 75 feet mike what happens 175 feet i don't know what you're supposed to do that's the cor that's that's nfpa 54. and it has to be accessible so i can't do it up in this location here unless i put like a little access hole and my son michael who's electrical contractor called hey dad we're doing this outside fireplace out here and the inspector is saying i have to bond the gas pipe i'm like michael this is not part of code dad i know it's not part of code don't don't get me into the code part dad just tell me what am i supposed to do i said okay i got your answer ready yeah dad i need it i got to get going dad can you give me the answer real quick don't try to teach me just give me the answer he's an electrical contractor you got to get it done right he's electrician i said what does anybody want you to do he goes oh the guy said for me to go ahead and connect it over there i'm like connected over there then just do it it's not a national requirement we are not required to comply with nfpa 54 and if you're going to do something you don't have to do you do it the way you want the way they want you to do it so by the way this only applies to inside buildings or attached to buildings not gas piping outside that's not going in a building so this is a great big mess it is not a code requirement the problem is if you actually do the bonding of the gas pipe and something goes wrong they are going to sue you and if you don't do the bonding and gas piping that you're not supposed to do they are going to sue you it's called life that's where it goes i'm done with that that's my story sticking with it you

Channel: MikeHoltNEC

Views: 9,312

Rating: 4.939394 out of 5

Keywords: Mike Holt Enterprises, Trainer, Electrician, NEC, National Electrical Code

Id: KN5dJO1dwN0

Length: 12min 16sec (736 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 24 2021