[RE-wrenches] California State Fire Marshal's "Solar Photovoltaic Installation Guidelines"

[Bill Brooks]

William,

The fire class rating of modules is not covered in the "Installation
Guidelines" that became the fire code. Fire rating of modules is a separate
issue that is found in the building code.

The reason there are many jurisdictions holding up permits at the moment is
that the State of California requires local jurisdictions to enforce
requirements for Wildland Urban Interface Areas and Very High Fire Severity
Zones. These areas make up about 20% of the state. Cal Fire has jurisdiction
over 70% of these areas and local jurisdictions--the rest. AHJs are simply
trying to address a state requirement, and most local jurisdictions follow
Cal Fire's lead which is to require Class A roofing in these areas. Now that
the building code requires that PV meet the required roof rating--we have an
issue.

The good news is that due to requests from CalSEIA, Cal Fire is putting
together a recommendation to delay enforcement of the new requirement for PV
systems for 180 days to give the PV industry time to develop mounting
solutions to meet the new requirement. That memo will hopefully go out in
the next week or two. If you are a CalSEIA member and would like to help on
this matter, you should contact the Director, Bernadette Del Chiaro. Also,
anyone who is having permitting difficulties can contact me directly offlist
as the U.S. Dept. of Energy is asking for anecdotal evidence about
permitting delays due to this issue. 

Several manufacturers of mounting equipment are currently working hard to
develop products that would allow many standard modules that now are Class C
rated to be rated as Class A in a mounting system. We should have several
available products by June of this year.

The train on this issue has been coming down the tracks for several years.
We have been effective in asking for the delay in enforcement because the
new version of the UL1703 test standard that can certify existing modules in
Class A systems was only published in October of 2013. The new test standard
has been under development for 5 years and includes about 150 tests to get
us to today. The reason we have not had more grief about this issue is that
very few other places in the U.S. require Class A roofing systems. That will
change in the near future as the benefits of higher rated roofs are
recognized by local fire departments all across the U.S. 

Bill.


-----Original Message-----
From: re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org
[mailto:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org] On Behalf Of William
Korthof
Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2014 10:51 AM
To: RE-wrenches
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] California State Fire Marshal's "Solar
Photovoltaic Installation Guidelines"

Bill, 

Thanks for the attached info. I don't see where the fire rating class of
solar modules is addressed though... 

In the IBC, the specific section (I believe 902.4 or close to that) seems to
call for solar modules to carry the same fire rating class as the roofing
class required of the building. At least that's the interpretation I
initially got from my local building and safety office. They've been sitting
on my plans for two weeks so far. When they turn them around, I may have
more to talk about.


/wk

William Korthof
714.875.3576
Sustainable Solutions
#956904

On Feb 13, 2014, at 9:34 AM, "Bill Brooks" <billbrooks7 at yahoo.com> wrote:

Yes Peter,

It is called the 2012 International Fire Code. The California guidelines
were turned into code in 2012. There is an explanation document I wrote
available online at:

http://solarabcs.org//about/publications/reports/fireguideline/index.html 

For those states that are using NFPA 1 as their fire code, it is nearly
identical.

Bill.


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