Master Label for ESE?

 

Does the UL master label provide a false sense of security to the owner of the installed site?

If UL labels only provide assurance to the manufacturing, materials, and installation, one could easily conclude that the effectiveness installed system should protect their facility. The reason I bring this up is that I have seen ESE devices with a UL manufacturing label on them. Hence it would be possible to acquire a master label for an installation with ESE devices.

It would seem that using the UL Master Label could give a false sense of assurance to the unknowing. I would suspect there are more building owners and contractors out there who lack the expertise to distinguish the difference.

Bruce Doerle
Director of Engineering
WUCF, Orlando

_____________________________________________

Co-moderator's Comments:

As was done with the original posting on this industry-practice topic, I referred Mr. Doerle's follow-up comments to Mrs. Jennifer Morgan of East Coast Lightning Equipment Inc. Her reply is given hereafter.

Abdul M. Mousa

___________________________________________

As stated previously, UL maintains two separate lightning protection standards- UL96 which governs the materials used for lightning protection and UL96A which governs system design and installation. UL gives an ESE terminal a listing because the terminal itself meets the size and material requirements of a single conventional air terminal. UL does not give labels for ESE systems, because the installations do not meet the requirements of UL96A.

UL is essentially listing ESE terminals with the expectation that these devices will be placed every 20 feet around the perimeter, which of course they aren't. It would be nice if UL would make this clearer.

ESE vendors make a lot of noise about their system components being UL listed, and they omit the fact that their installed systems fail to meet UL requirements. It is not possible to get a UL Master Label for an ESE system, and the UL labels on the components of an ESE system is definitely a source of purposeful confusion.

I do think that the UL Master Label offers a building owner a real sense of security. It is a true third party inspection and UL is quite rigorous in verifying compliance these days. If a building owner is tricked into believing that their ESE system is UL compliant - that is a different story.

Jennifer Morgan

This information was submitted by Abdul Mousa from the Lightning Safety & Power Quality Issues group on Yahoo. To learn more about this group click here.