Same deal here in Illinois. State licensing code for sprinkler contractors requires compliance with current 13, 20 etc. State licensing code for healthcare facilities follows the lead of the Feds, which uses the 2000 LSC and the 1999 13. As an engineer, I generally require compliance with the current standard and also reference the locally adopted one or facility licensing one. I then specify compliance with the more stringent, or the one providing the greater level of safety. So far, no RFI's on conflicts that cannot be resolved in this fashion. For example, if the one says max 130 sq ft and the other says max 100 sq ft, then give them the 100 sq ft area and that satisfies both. Any specific issues come up?
Dave David A. de Vries, P.E., CSP Firetech Engineering Incorporated --- On Thu, 1/28/10, George Church <[email protected]> wrote: From: George Church <[email protected]> Subject: Quandry-design to two editions of 13? To: [email protected] Date: Thursday, January 28, 2010, 10:20 AM I'm close to going postal. It's been over a year since I posed a question to PA's departments of Health and Labor & Industry, and we've still yet to receive other than conflicting direction. I'm sure this occurs in other jurisdictions throughout the US and maybe someone has solved this, it certainly is not unique to PA. Summary: PA DOH enforces compliance with the 1999 edition of NFPA 13 because it is the referenced edition in the 2000 Life Safety Code used by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (Federal Health and Human Services). Both PA DOH and CMS itself have reiterated clearly that they will accept ONLY compliance with the 1999 edition; they really don't care if a newer code is deemed equal or better protection by NFPA, or what edition of NFPA 13 is referenced by the applicable local building code. PA's Dept of Labor and Industry is charged with administration and enforcement of the PA Uniform Construction Code, now based on the 2009 I-Codes, so NFPA 13-2007 edition is now our standard. Under Pennsylvania law, all facilities that are regulated by the Health Care Facilities Act must also comply with the requirements of the Pennsylvania Construction Code Act and its regulations. Quandry: So- how do we design a system to simultaneously comply with both 1999 and (for now) 2007 editions of NFPA 13? We cannot comply simply with the more recent standard as equal or better, that'd be too easy. CMS and DOH have both stated this is unacceptable. Now we're certainly not the only sprinkler contractor doing work in health care and nursing homes where CMS mandates apply- i.e., anywhere reimbursement for services is covered by Medicare and/or Medicaid. And PA is not the only state adopting a code with post-1999 #13 as the adopted standard. What are the rest of you doing to comply? George Church Rowe Sprinkler _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://fireball.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [email protected] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[email protected] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field) _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://fireball.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum For Technical Assistance, send an email to: [email protected] To Unsubscribe, send an email to:[email protected] (Put the word unsubscribe in the subject field)
