Older house feeders, no EGC, changes to service

[JoeNorm]

Hello All,

We are adding an ESS(battery backup) to a residence. Current setup is a 400 service, one 200 amp feed to shop, one 200 amp feed to house. Both feeds are 3-wire direct burial without equipment ground.

The loads of the compound do not warrant 400 amps, so we're downsizing to a 200 amp service with a new meter/main combo. From the meter we will feed the ESS. The ESS will then serve the shop panel and we will install a feed through panel to go to the house. So the entire place is backed by the ESS.

What tripped me up is not having the option to get EGC run with the feeders serving the final run to the house(all the upstream runs will get a new EGC). But I believe I am compliant with the 250.32 exceptions for already installed feeders.

So the plan would be to bond the neutral in the meter/main combo and separate grounds and neutrals all the way to the shop panel. But since the feed to the house from the shop will remain 3-wire, we will leave the grounds and neutrals bonded in the main house panel.

Based on the code and previous threads I've read this seems OK. Just want to get confirmation it is a safe and code compliant install.

thanks

 

[tortuga]

So the 400A service si like its onwn pole or structure? Then 3 wire feeders to two buildings? Sounds compliant to me, just make sure you get your G-N bonds at the service and each structure.

I dislike 'downgrading' service sizes for a farm or rural property it reminds me of putting too small of tires on a truck. Id try to keep the 400A and add the backup with two transfer switches.

 

[JoeNorm]

I don't like the downgrade either, but that was how it got designed, unfortunately. I think in this case it will be fine.