NFPA Journal - May/June 2019 - 15

READERS
RESPOND TO
NFPA JOURNAL

deliver power due to the extent of
damage to the power grid, as occurred
in the California fires and in the Puerto
Rico hurricanes.
 The power to hospitals must be
maintained, not only to sustain the hospital's usual functions but to maintain
equipment such as sprinkler systems,
water pumps, waste plants, and others
that are vital for the hospital's operation. Power should also be maintained
for some non-essential loads, such as
receptacles in patient rooms and lights
throughout the hospital.
 All hospitals must be designed for
100 percent capacity of emergency
generators, and they must have a minimum fuel capacity to run the hospital
for at least 48 hours. Hospitals no
longer need the three transfer switches
for equipment branch, life safety, and
critical-they need power for the total
capacity requirements of the institution.
This must be a mandatory requirement
of the National Electric Code®.
 
RICARDO RODRÍGUEZ DEL VALLE
Engineer
Ingenieros Consultores, CSP
San Juan, Puerto Rico
Jonathan Hart, technical lead, fire protection engineering at NFPA, responds:
Many of the essential electrical system
performance requirements found in
Article 517 have been extracted from
NFPA 99, Health Care Facilities Code.
The provisions for providing emergency
power are intended to be the minimum
requirements to provide an adequate
level of safety. The approach you have
taken in the design of your facility
seems to have gone above and beyond
the minimum specified in NFPA 99 and
Article 517.
NFPA 99 requires that circuits
serving equipment that is critical to
the immediate survival of patients,
provides life safety functions, or is
essential to functional facility operation
be provided with emergency power
for an amount of time determined
by the facility in consideration with
their emergency operations plan. This

allows for a facility or jurisdiction to
determine its specific need based on its
specific conditions.
 In developing the minimum criteria,
the technical committees must balance
the fact that the code will be applied
to various types of facilities in loca-

The power to hospitals
must be maintained,
not only to sustain the
usual functions but to
maintain equipment
such as sprinkler
systems, water pumps,
waste plants, and others
that are vital for the
hospital's operation.

13 requirements for when to replace
sprinklers and what the sprinkler cabinet should include, but also the reasons
and insights that only NFPA staff or a
committee member would normally
know. A sprinkler that has operated
or a sprinkler that is impaired for any
reason is an unsafe condition that puts
people and property at risk. Having a
cabinet with spare sprinklers and a tool
nearby to quickly place the system in
operable condition makes every property with a sprinkler system safe and
code compliant.
Thanks to Brian for sharing that
knowledge. I plan to share the article
with my colleagues and customers.
 
MARK CONROY
Brooks Equipment Company
Charlotte, North Carolina

Fire prevention in
cold storage facilities?
tions around the world. The minimum
requirements must be considered along
with the requirements for a robust
hazard vulnerability analysis that
can vary significantly from location
to location. What may be needed in
one location for one set of conditions
may not be the appropriate solution
for another location with different
considerations.

'In Compliance' sprinkler kudos
To the editor:
The "In Compliance" section of NFPA
Journal always provides insights that we
as members normally can't get anywhere
else. I appreciated the recent article
by Brian O'Connor ["NFPA 13," March/
April] on the need for a cabinet with
spare sprinklers and a sprinkler wrench
for properties with sprinkler systems.
Although the article addresses
facility managers directly, it contains
information that suppliers of safety
equipment, installer/maintainers, and
the authority having jurisdiction can
also use for compliance and enforcement. The importance of the article is
that it not only talks about the NFPA

To the editor:
The current issue of NFPA Journal
includes a feature story on the protection of cold storage ["Cold Fact,"
March/April]. The article was written
by a product manager for Viking and,
apart from the last paragraph, concentrates solely on sprinkler systems as
the protection methodology.
Sprinkler systems are the best protection methodology for the facility
itself-the expectation is that fire will
destroy part of the structure's sandwich panels, but the facility can be
repaired and returned to service. The
issue here is that the real value isn't in
the facility, but in the stored products.
The ratio of the value of the stored
products to the value of the facility is
currently approximately 7:1, and as
facilities become taller, this ratio will
increase. For the vast majority of products stored in cold storage facilities,
the impact of smoke invariably leaves
them unfit for human consumption. As
a result, the products are dumped, at a
cost far greater than that of repairing
the facility.
The risk analysis therefore depends
upon whether the storage facility is
N F PA . O R G / J O U R N A L * NFPA JOURNAL

| 15
http://nfpa.org/journal
NFPA Journal - May/June 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - May/June 2019
