BEGIN PLANNING NOW TO PREVENT LIGHTNING STRIKE DAMAGE TO YOUR EQUIPMENT COMING THIS SPRING

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Castle Rock, Colorado, United States of America (Free-Press-Release.com) December 22, 2010 -- Being prepared takes time and protection planning during lightning season is another wasted year with behind the '8 BALL' repair and maintenance towards on going damage. Collecting data on your most susceptible towers and equipment along with soil resistivity should begin soon. This will allow the development of a plan to properly ground tower and associated buildings and electrically protect equipment.

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BEGIN PLANNING NOW TO PREVENT LIGHTNING STRIKE DAMAGE TO YOUR EQUIPMENT COMING THIS SPRING

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Generally towers 150 foot in height can expect a hit once every other year, and 300 foot towers can expect approximately two (2) hits every year in most locations in the country. These lightning strike frequencies may be halved if on flat terrain, doubled if on the east coast, and tripled if along the gulf or in Florida.

Wireless providers that own 100 towers on flat terrain (150 foot in height) may expect a lightning hit every four years to those 100 towers, or saying it another way, expect 25 of those towers to be hit every year. If you have designed a standard 5 ohm tower ground, a limit found in most wireless specifications and in Motorola’s R56 Standard, expect an average of $25k in damage from each lightning hit. In a year, your maintenance bill, from owning the above 100 towers, is going to be $625K. If you are one of the ‘Big Seven’ and own a 1000 towers, your yearly maintenance bill is going to be $6.0+ Million!

There is a difference between minimum design standards found in the National Electrical Code (NEC) and good engineering practice to protect against lightning strike energy. The scope of the NEC does not cover lightning and there is not a hint of what Ground Potential Rise (GPR) is, does or causes. Nor is GPR mentioned in Motorola's R56 current standard either!

In fact, there is no code book or published standard today that relates to the engineering design of equipment locations to prevent damage from lightning strike energy. However, this type of information is available in the "Guide for Protection of Equipment and Personnel from Lightning", in ASCE's Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities, August 2002, by E. Duckworth. Also a new IEEE Std. 1692 will be available in 2011 that used the above ASCE Journal Publication as a seed document for its development.

An average 30 kA lightning strike will produce a 7.5 kV GPR into the earth. If you do not have a grounding system that is properly designed to bleed off lightning strike energy, you will be part of that average yearly loss mentioned above. In addition, if you have not isolated wire-line communications that entered your tower site, a grounding system of near zero ohms will not help either! Proper grounding and proper isolation go together, and a good design along with good engineering practice requires a well trained and knowledgeable Electrical Protection Engineer.

If those 100 towers would have been properly grounded and isolated, you would not have had a $625K maintenance bill for the year or $6,250 per tower in lightning maintenance damage every year. This is quite a maintenance cost to your company that does not have to exist at all.

Design a total site grounding system that centers around a single point ground. A single point ground is an absolute must for equipment protection against a lightning induced ground potential rise (GPR). Without a tower site single point ground (SPG), equipment damage from lightning will be a perpetual problem.

Soil resistivity measurements must be made at the tower and building location in order to design a grounding system that will meet lightning GPR specifications. Available real-estate, soil conditions, physical location, typical weather for the area all needs to be taken into account.

The tower grounding system design requires radial grounding (spider legs) that will move the lightning's high frequency currents and associated induced GPR away from the equipment building and the single point ground location. The engineering design of a proper grounding system and isolation of wire-line communication facilities to protect against lightning induced GPR will save many maintenance dollars over the life of a tower site.

In very high soil resistivity locations, the use of Lo-Ohm cement placed over the radials in a trench is a must to obtain the capacitive coupling to the earth that will properly dissipate lightning strike energy. The design of grounding systems that will properly dissipate lightning quickly and reducing damage requires expertise in grounding design, along with a number of complex computer driven equations to accommodate the local situation.

More information can be found online at http://www.lightning-protection-institute.com

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