Chapter 2 addresses the compliance and enforcement process in a general manner and discusses the roles and responsibilities of each of the major parties, the compliance forms, and the process for field verification and/or diagnostic testing. This section highlights compliance enforcement issues for water heating systems.
The initial compliance documentation consists of the Certificate of Compliance and Installation Certificate. These documents are included on the plans and specifications. The Certificate of Compliance has a section where special features are listed. The following are water heating features that should be listed in this section of the Certificate of Compliance:
1. Any system type other than one water heater per dwelling unit
2. Non-NAECA large water heater performance
3. Indirect water heater performance
4. Instantaneous gas water heater performance
5. Distribution system type and controls
6. Solar system
7. Combined hydronic system
If any of these measures are called out on the Certificate of Compliance special attention should be given to make sure that identical information in located on the plan set. Highlighting key concerns or adding notes will allow field inspectors to quickly catch any measures that should be installed that made a significant difference in compliance.
During the construction process, the contractor and/or the specialty contractors complete the necessary sections of the Installation Certificate. For water heating there is only one section to be completed where information about the installed water heating system is entered.
Inspectors should check that the number and types of water heater systems indicated on the installation certificate, corresponds to the approved Certificate of Compliance. The distribution system is also significant and must correspond to plan specifications.
1. Single Family
HERS verification is required for all hot water distribution types that include options for field verification. The first type is alternative designs to conventional distribution systems which include parallel piping, demand recirculation, automatic and 'manual on demand recirculation. The second type is for distribution systems that can only be used when verified by field verification. These include, compact design, and point of use. For all of these cases the field inspector must verify that the eligibility requirements for the specific system are met.
The one water heating system distribution credit that is different is the pipe insulation credit. This credit applies if all pipes in a distribution system are insulated and can only be applied to non recirculating systems. If this credit is taken in combination with installation credit then field verification is required. To meet the installation requirements hot water pipes located in insulated walls or buried in the attic insulation comply with the requirements – without pipe insulation. In this case, a field inspector must verify that the eligibility requirements for pipe insulation have been met.
2. Multi-family
The only field inspector verification for water heating that applies to central domestic hot water recirculation systems in multi-family buildings is the verification of multiple distribution lines for central recirculation systems.