Light pole grounding

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William Lloyd

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Mike,
At a metal pole for a parking lot light is the seperate ground rod a requirement of the code or does the ground go back to the system ground at the service? Also is the ground rod now against the code?
 
William Lloyd said:
Mike,
At a metal pole for a parking lot light is the seperate ground rod a requirement of the code or does the ground go back to the system ground at the service? Also is the ground rod now against the code?
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The ground rod is not required by the NEC, and it's not against the NEC to install one.

However, the pole must be grounded by an EGC connected back to the source, and if a ground rod is installed, it needs to be connected to the EGC.

EGC----ground rod-----pole---fixture (all connected together)
 
I think it is important to note that auxiliary electrodes SERVE NO FUNCTION what-so-ever.

The pole itself and its atttachment to its base will provide all the lightning protection your going to get.

It must be stressed that grounding at a light pole does NOT relieve the requirements for equipment grounding (bonding). There must be an effective fault path established via an equipment grounding conductor run with the circuit conductors and connected at the source and at the metal parts of the circuit.

Earth CANNOT clear ground-faults that occur at equipment. Please take note.
 
I think it is important to note that auxiliary electrodes SERVE NO FUNCTION what-so-ever.
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I do not think I would make such an all encompassing statement, when it MIGHT minimize some damage under certain conditions that no one can determine in advance, too many unknowns.
 
in all the times ive installed pole lights i only installed ground rods in them once. and that was when i was an apprentice and first got in the field. you can install a ground rod if you want but its not required.
 
I find it almost humerous when traffic signals with 4 fat j bolts, that can be 5 to 12 feet long, are also spec'd to have a ground rod. Parking lot lights also have 4 nice j bolts and often a steel rebar cage. I'm not sure what extra benefit the ground rod is providing. That said, I have one customer who's light post took a good lightning hit, and it blew the I-Line breaker right out of the panel and onto the floor in pieces. Lightning does pretty much whatever it wants to.
 
We recently did two solar panel powered traffic units.Self contained 24 volt batteries charged by the solar panels.Had a lighting hit near by one,blew a control fuse.Ground courtesy of ground rod as instructions.
 
Lighting can and will do what it wants depending on the intensity and duration of the stroke, the best we can hope to do is minimize the damage. I do not fault anyone for additional grounding that meets the requirements of NFPA codes, it may offer protection under most circumstances and it adds to the contractors bottom line. Usually the more elaborate systems have a spec that requires testing and someone (?) might pick up some additional work.
 
While that may be true Brian, I don't think it is in the interest of the OWNER to have uncessary costs associated with labor, materials, ect. for something that MIGHT do something, but is LIKELY to do nothing.

They would be much better off spending the money and time on Surge Protection and other truly effective means that have established documentation of reliability and cost savings.
 
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