Grounding to Cold Water

This doesn't sound right at all and as you have described would be illegal down here in Australia and New Zealand.

Is this installation in USA (I am not intimately familiar with the American residential wiring code so there may be a valid reason why this has been done this way)?

I live in Ohio, US. I'm thinking I should have the electrician come back and connect these grounds to a grounding lug in my breaker box, which is grounded to a ground rod.

Should the ground wires be secured in the attic as well or is it ok if they just lay across the insulation?

Please advise on the proper way to ground these receptacles without running all new wire or installing GFCIs since I have electronics connected to them. Thanks.

The electronics won't care about the grounding wire. Grounding is for personnel protection in the event of a fault.

It use to be that grounding to metal water pipes was acceptable. With today's use of plastic pipes is no longer in some areas. If in the future repairs are done to that water pipe and replaced with plastic it will no longer be grounded. You will need to get the information from your local government.

If a repair to a copper/metal system, is carried out using plastic, then the section of plastic pipe should be bridged across using an earthing strap.

Your installation is not correct. The grounding conductor should be installed in in the grounding strip located in your breaker panel. Sounds like you got a jack-leg to do your work.

Something Like this. In your case the green wire would be connected to the EGC terminal bar.

Sorry I keep showing-up as "Guest": I've registered (twice) but still have not "received an email".

I should have done this job myself. I have terrible luck when it comes to choosing contractors! Besides improperly grounding my outlets, the guy re-installed one outlet upside down and I had to reposition it because of my surge protector. He also did a terrible job concealing the ground on the cold water pipe, and the electrical tape that he used to secure it to the pipe was coming off, so I reworked that, too. As it turns out, I will be reworking what I reworked.

I don't think it will be easy running the ground to the service panel on the outside wall of my ranch house because of the pitch in the attic (probably why he didn't). Any suggestions that might make this easier? Also, should the ground run through joists in the attic?

Having ground wires haphazardly draped across the ceiling joists in your attic is not a good idea. Tripping hazard, possibility of damaging conductors while moving about, etc.

Is your house build on slab or crawl-space or basement? If not on slab, you may be able to find a circuit that runs from basement/crawlspace all the way to the attic. You could remove that circuit from the panel (swith off main breaker first) and pull the conductor up into the attic space with ground wires secured to the end (if the holes are large enough to squeeze them through. Pull extra wire into the attic and tape the original circuit back onto the ground wires and re-pull the whole thing to the basement. This could help with the routing. If you have a slab on grade, you may have to do it the hard way (sorry), which is under those low eaves.

I would definitely run the grounds to the main breaker panel.

Just a comment on one part of Your question/answer "He installed one outlet upside down" . A while back there was a discusion on the correct way to install an outlet, i.e. with ground up or down. the electrical code does not specify which way is right it is left to the installer to decide which way to install it. in other words up or down either way is correct. just sayin.

oilcan13

" the electrical tape that he used to secure it to the pipe was coming off "

!!!

He should've at least used an earth clamp - this one is BS951 type EC15 (for example):

O.P. said in another post that he did - the tape was only used to "control" the routing. Sloppy, but that bit at least is not illegal

Whoops! - Sorry, all - came to the thread a bit late & ran out of time reading it through. Should've kept my mouth shut 'til later.

BTW - the thread would be a helluva lot easier to read if some more of you guests came clean. Fyz has explained (here or elsewhere) - but do you all have excuses for not registering, logging on or even signing your posts?

Not having a go at you in particular (whoever you are).

You can run it to the inside panel if you have one. how old is your house?

1950's house. Main service panel is in back bedroom; it's just a tight squeeze in the attic to feed down into it. Any tricks to easily feed the ground into that panel?

The best trick would be a surface mount to the panel.

Try drilling and feeding from the bedroom (upwards), and use part of a bent (wire) coat-hanger as a "needle". You can tape the wire to the coat-hanger once you can access the hanger from the attic.

Once you accept that you will have to make good any holes in the wall/ceiling whenever you finish and so make larger holes, the problem becomes a lot simpler. (It's a hard life)

Such practice is very bad since the Resistance of the earth fault loop is greatly reduced and could lead to false tripping of protective devices.

More so faults from other people practicing unrecommended rules like Ur electrician will affect Ur premises in same proportion and touching any metal bonded to the pipe could lead to electrocution. It is important to note that there is a potential existing between the pipe and the real ground.

Dickson

It falls outside British Standard 7671. The reason is that there are so many plastic pipes used in water utilities' supplies these days that it is not possible to assure a TT earth system connection using a water pipe.

TT can be provided with earth rods driven in at the premises, and the earth bar at the distribution board will be connected to them. The number of rods and the connections to them are dependent on local circumstances, not least of all is the local water table height.

It is always worthwhile ensuring that a TT-earthed premises is covered by a RCCD set to trip at, oh, say 100mA. It may even be a requirement under the local code; it is under BS7671.

NO, this is NOT CORRECT. Many years ago, almost all grounding in the US was done using the water pipe. This changed because of the common use of plastic or other non conducting material for water pipe. Sometimes the pipe might be metal but the joints are not. I am not in my office so I don't have the National Electric Code book handy, but the section on grounding says something to the effect that if metal water pipe is present, it must be grounded, but you have to supplement that with additional grounds.

I don't have a current Canadian Electrical Safety Code, but according to Section 26 of the 1994 edition, the method described is acceptable if grounding type receptacles are used to replace ungrounded types in an existing installation.

Rule 26-700(8) reads:

Where grounding type receptacles are used in existing installations to replace the ungrounded type, the grounding terminal shall be effectively bonded to ground and one of the following methods may be used:

a) By connection to a metal raceway or cable sheath that is bonded to ground;

b) By connection to the system ground by means of a separate bonding conductor;

c) By bonding to an adjacent grounded metal cold water pipe.

So, your electrician is not the fool the other posters seem to suggest.

<...By bonding to an adjacent grounded metal cold water pipe...>

The original poster needs to show that the pipe is grounded and therefore that the whole system is TT! This is what the earth loop impedance testing protocol is all about.

Such an installation would still fall outside BS7671....

It is possible that the contractor was OK(ish) and that you are misinterpreting the situation.

Required in most places and standard practice just about everywhere: all operational wiring should be three-conductor (live, neutral and ground) wiring with the three wires run in a single sheath back to your distribution board. If the system is properly grounded at the distribution board, than no additional earthing is needed for the electrical system itself. If it's a pre-existing system the electrician should have checked the pre-existing grounding at the distribution board and corrected it if necessary.

This leaves one additional requirement, which is good practice everywhere, and a legal requirement in many jurisdictions: any other accessible conductors of electricity (piping, etc) that are not part of the mains wiring should also be connected to the same ground. Although I would not generally condone untidy wiring, it could be that this is the function the loose ground wires and the connection at the incoming water pipe are performing.

[In reality you are safe from electrical shocks if you have Faraday cage grounding of this type and no external ground connection at all. The reason for connecting to a more universal ground is to avoid fire hazard if there is a connection between live and this ground - the problem would be caused by current from cage ground to other grounds that you cannot access]

Personally, I prefer to supplement these systems with a 25-mA RCD - but unfortunately you may find some older equipments have filters for electrical interference that jointly exceed this level.

Fyz

Re-reading what you wrote (and also what I wrote): are you saying that you had the electrician add grounds to sockets that were already there? In that case he needs to provide a secure ground path to back to the distribution ("breaker") box; ideally, this should run alongside the power cable for each socket.

But this would connect the cases of some equipments to ground, which could increase your risk of electrocution in the event that some apparently unrelated conductor was shorted to the live of the system (see "mice" for how this could happen). This is why he should also to ensure that pipework is properly grounded.

So, if what you described is all that there is, it is unsatisfactory in every respect. If it is an adjunct to a proper grounding path to the sockets, it is acceptable, although not ideal (because it is untidy and sensitive to disturbance).

P.S. Looking at some of the other comments, they suggest that sign-off by the inexpert householder is enough to let the electrician off the hook. If that is right, maybe it is one area where a more European-style nannying approach would actually be sensible (it has long been illegal to carry out electrical contracting work for reward unless you were accredited - and then the contractor has to take responsibility for the safety and legality of their installation, no matte what the customer may sign (the exception is where the customer is accredited and can sign the installation off on that basis).

This is true also in the US. The building inspector should not issue a permit if the work was not done to code.

But OP doesn't tell us where he is so we will never really get to the bottom-line on this.

I think #3 was the same guest; if so, it's O'hio.

Response to Guest re Grounding to Cold water~:

I undersatnd that latest UK regs do not require pipework to be bonded to earth so all the pretty green and yellow wires on my installation to the water pipes are now rendered redundant!

I will not be removing them even though I understand this is the latest state of play! I prefer to play safe!

Recent work is not bonded by the Installers concerned

Sleepy

I saw the draft, and my recollection is that the changes that were incorporated included disallowing pipework as the main ground for the electrical system (I think it was previously an addendum). However, contrary to your information, this did not remove the need to bond all exposed conductive material (above some specified size) to ground. (BTW, post-publication commentary suggests that this was not changed between the draft and the final issue)

What was removed is the insistence on supplementary local bonding in specific domestic hazardous locations (kitchens, bathrooms, etc) - but only if you can prove that there is a continuous metal service pipe between the metalwork and an earth (ground) bond.

I agree that this is a relaxation, but in compensation there is an added requirement for RCD protection. Although I have reservations (how many people test their RCDs sufficiently regularly?), the cost-risk trade off is still more severely weighted in favour of safety than in most other areas (doubtless coroners' verdicts will indicate if this remains a correct assessment).

Fyz

FYI, BS7671:2008 (IEE regs 17th edn) states at 542.2.4:

" ... The metallic pipe of a water supply utility shall not be used as an earth electrode. Other metallic water supply pipework shall not be used as an earth electrode unless precautions are taken against its removal and it has been considered for such a use."

Similar conditions are mentioned regarding protective conductors (as distinct from earth electrodes) in 543.2, where a metallic water pipe may be classed as "an extraneous-conductive-part".

Hi John

I assume you are providing chapter and verse to confirm what I wrote, in which case my thanks. (Certainly the first italicised paragraph does exactly that regarding the use of metallic water supply pipework as the electrode that supplies the earth to the whole system.)

Unfortunately, the usual interpretation of "FYI" is that the information is correcting an error, and those reading superficially may interpret your intervention accordingly. In addition, your note regarding 543.2 is too cryptic for me to be certain what it means. I recollect the draft still specified conditions under which extraneous conductive parts have to be grounded - and nothing I heard during the discussion suggested this would be removed. However, I've no idea what clause number that would have been.

N.B. that we should of course be able to access the whole document on line - except that the IET have continued and exacerbated the practice of its principal predecessor (the IEE) of regarding publications primarily as a source of income rather than as a resource to improve the practice of engineering (the latter being the terms of its charter). And yes, I have made representations to that effect.

Regards

Fyz

Hi, Fyz,

Sorry if you took the "FYI" that way; I'd intended it to mean exactly what it says - I certainly didn't mean it to be in any sense a correction. Maybe I'm still a bit un-web-savvy.

Re: the second paragraph. The whole chapter (543) regarding what you can and can't use for protective earths is pretty cryptic - I was trying a (rushed) summary (which in retrospect didn't work very well). I don't have the book here (it's in the office at the factory where I'm contracted), but it was saying, roughly speaking, that you can use a waterpipe as a protective earth, provided that "precautions are taken against its removal and it has been considered for such a use". There is a fuzzy bit, in that water pipes are not specifically mentioned, but have to be considered as an "extraneous-conductive-part [sic]". The applicable section (think it was 543.2.6) is referenced in the index under "Water pipes".

100% in agreement with your remarks about access to the document.

Cheers,
John

I will have to find a copy. It sounds like someone has sneaked in a pseudo-waiver. Doubtless it is supposed to be signed off by a suitably qualified person (how to find the definition - huh!), but I for one couldn't imagine signing it off in a domestic situation

The problem with incoming water-pipes is that failing pipes from the main to the dwelling are usually replaced with MDPE. The replacing plumber ought to check that this does not impact electrical grounds, but this cannot be relied on. However, if all unrelated metal is connected to the same ground (even if floating), it ought to be safe.

To my mind, this is a situation where there could be more than one way of achieving safety, so long as everyone works from the same standards, as the methods are not necessarily compatible. One way would be to eschew grounding* and for every circuit to have its own independent RCD, each backed up by a shared RCD. Then you could get away with two wiring faults (one to neutral on one circuit and one to live on another).

*I recently bought a double-insulated lamp from a well-known multiple. It seems that the first layer of insulation is the plastics around the wiring, and the second is anodisation of the exterior metal. OK I suppose until the mice get gnawing and a dedicated cleaner starts on the polish. If we allow such things without RCDs (and it appears we do), we might just be safer with isolated pipework.

I suppose there must be a standard somewhere that says it's OK to rely on an anodic coating for insulation, or the manufacturer wouldn't've got away with CE/UL (or whatever) marking (assuming it's marked!). Maybe the marking needs to be challenged? Sounds highly iffy to me.

You persuaded me to check the rules (as best can):

Apparently there is nothing to say that the "two layers of insulation" need to be physically separated, so you are apparently allowed to use a single thicker layer of insulation to achieve this "double protection"; in this case the "double insulation" consists of an insulation layer around each metallic conductor plus a secondary insulating sheath that protects the pair. Given that the layers can be subject to the same single failure mechanism, I'm even less sanguine about this than I would be about relying on internal anodisation (were there any!). I need to remove the (non-polarised) dimmer anyway, so I'll have to replace the wiring - I may as well include a ground sheath at the same time (the lamp itself will still be "floating").

Be interested to see the internals of this thing. Is there, for instance, a possibility of a connection to the internal lamp terminals coming adrift, and a live conductor touching the inside of the case?

Classifying mains cord as double insulation has to be OK I guess, or appliance cords would have to be run in flexible conduit (or replaced with MIMS ). Can't guarantee that someone's not going to get the cord trapped under the leg of a metal table, for instance.

" Can't guarantee that someone's not going to get the cord trapped under the leg of a metal table, for instance."

Agreed, you can't totally eliminate that risk. But the exterior cord is visible, so you've a good chance of catching that problem before it shorts to the metal table. Even without that difference, the unavoidable (but rare) existence of a risk is not a reason for systematically introducing it into a range of products. Having experienced more than the odd tingle from my grandmother's 1940s "double insulated" iron frame standard lamp (paper plus woven fabric on each wire, and the same again around the pair, I think), I had expected that the standards would have been tightened.

I imagine that it's one of those practices that would not be introduced if it didn't already exist, and the reason it has not been changed is that the incidence of identified serious injury due to this cause has been sufficiently low that the cost of change apparently exceeds any actuarial safety value.

<...latest UK regs do not require pipework to be bonded to earth so all the pretty green and yellow wires on my installation to the water pipes are now rendered redundant...>

On the contrary: BS7671 requires pipework within the building to be bonded to earth. On the plus side, installing additional equipotential bonding falls outside part P of the Building Regulations, and is non-notifiable.

Um...what slidewinder said.

That being said, codes are just for "minimum standards". He could have done better. Would you have paid for better though?

What you can do is install a GFI on an outlet on that run. Test it. There is a test button on the front. See if it works. If it works, then the ground is good enough. If it doesn't work, then call him back, and pay him to do a better job.

Electricity is not magic. The codes are there for a reason. If your electrician failed to follow code, then you have a reason to call him back. You can check on that easily enough by learning the code for your area. (Oh I don't know...the local library maybe?) You have signed off on this job already, so say good bye to any possible legal recourse. Don't even go there. Just get the job done right.

About running cable in the attic. Me...I do not use anything but BX cable in my attic...it only takes one mouse! And the pesky critters seem to have a fondness for the insulation on the cable. Yet most electricians balk at using BX cable in residential construction because it is so much more expensive and takes so much more time to install. Considering how important electricity is in modern construction, it is a wonder that more people don't demand much better than code for their electrics.

Re: Danger of mice chewing insulation of exposed wiring

Several years ago we were asked to inspect the wiring of an old house on the Trent University campus. In the attic crawl space we found that mice had stripped the insulation down to bare wire on several runs of NMD-90 (non-metallic sheathed cable). It's astonishing that there hadn't been a fire.

It was noticed however, that the mice had only chewed on the old cloth/paper/tar

wrapped conductors. Branch circuits that had newer plastic insulated NMD-90 were completely untouched by the critters. So, if mice everywere have similar tastes, using armoured cable is unnecessary for rodent protection if new plastic NMD-90 is used.

Yet, my experience was the exact opposite....they ate the new stuff, including a roll I had stored up there, but left the old tarry stuff alone. Go figure. OTOH, I wired up a climbing gym a few years ago with BX, and although rats, mice, and squirrels abounded, there were no problems. This was a commercial installation, and therefore all the electrics needed to completely enclosed in conduit. BX was the easiest, but certainly not the least expensive solution.

Who said that rodents didn't do gastronomic culture?

(But maybe wiring from different sources tasted different)

Myself, I find they mainly attack paper during the nesting season.

Not too many years ago, like almost 50 or so, it was almost manditory to run a secure grounding wire from the Ckt. box to the shower metal down spout, I refrained from this and and on new construction used a 6' grounding rod and was call to task about it by the inspector and the builder until I showed the Shower was plumbed in plastic to the Shower and tub area..at that time the drain was done.. in cast iron...To many times in todays world the plumbing for potable water is installed in Plastic to the house and only the risers are metal and are not sufficient ground..

I concur. And if there was plastic plumbing a GFI would not work would it. Nor would it work if later on, on a totally unrelated job, a plumber replaced a section of copper with a section of plastic. Seems like you, like me, believe in building better than code. Not many of those in the building trades believe in that. They believe in getting the minimum done, getting signed off, getting paid and getting out.

Last house I built, I demanded BX throughout. Almost doubled the cost of the job. I didn't get that investment back when I sold though. Commercial construction is much safer. (there was much more to that job...I learned that it doesn't pay to NOT cut corners...)

Ok, I'm getting some conflicting but good advice from everyone and it sounds like, to do the job right, I should ground these outlets in my breaker box. Also, I should run the ground wire through the joists in the attic. I guess I got what I paid for (well, I didn't pay yet)! I just don't understand, especially when it comes to electrical work, how someone could do such a sloppy job!

If you are going to use a pipe for a ground you have to clamp the wire to the pipe within a foot or so of the pipe entering the ground.

You mention taping over the connection of the ground wire to the pipe. The ground wire has to be clamped to the pipe and the ground wire has to be a certain size.

From the sounds of it you have a fly by night electrician. Get it inspected by city building inspector. You can't afford to risk burning your house down for the sake of saving a few dollars.

But it may well be using a clamp but appear at first sight to be taped. It's easy to tell once you know what you should be looking for.

I'm the OP. I registered for this site several days ago but have not received a confirmation email as of yet so I can't login under that user_id and unfortunately keep showing-up as "Guest".

Anyway, I live in Ohio. I haven't signed-off on anything nor have I paid this company yet. The electrician said he was licensed so I assumed he knew what he was doing. I probably should talk with my building inspector before I pay anything and do anymore work.

Correct.

Call the building inspector. Tell him that you have doubt that work complies with code. He will inspect it and render a decision.

If the electrician has no license, he will be taken care of by the City or Town.

Don't pay him until this matter is clarified.

Here is the simplified version of what you should have. You should have a total of 3 wires running to each outlet all the way back to your box. One is hot, one is your neutral or the return for the hot, and the last is your ground. The older systems only had the hot and the neutral wires. This is not enough now even though you can grandfather in and still use it. For that matter you can still have the old knob and tube wiring that was done 100 years ago but I would not have it in my house.

Theoretically you can run your ground to the neutral and in fact they end up being connected in the breaker box, but this is not code or safe.

Three wires all the way through or it is not acceptable.

Rich Hurd

Yes, you should have this. But in addition any exposed metal-work should be grounded.

You said he TAPED the wire to the water pipe? No clamp? This guy is no electrician, he is a dangerous idiot.

Report him to the authority having juristiction (city or county inspector) in your area and get a real electrician to fix the wiring for you.

OP here: no, it is clamped, about 5ft above where the copper pipe goes into the slab, and the clamp is above the water lines that are fed throughout my house. The electrical tape was used sloppily to secure the ground wire between where it's clamped and where it passes through my ceiling into the attic; it runs along the water line feeding the hot water heater then runs up a gas line into the attic. I replaced the tape with tie wraps and concealed the wire better.

I talked with my building inspector and he said it was ok to run the separate grounds as long as they were grounded in the service panel. So, that's my plan. However, I am going to call the owner of the company that did this work and let him know what the electrician did, because I'm not sure if the electrician is a sub or employee.

OP here: electrician is coming back next week to ground these 4 outlets to my service panel and to secure ground wires in attic. He still insists that in the Cleveland, OH area it is ok to ground to cold water and he has been pulling permits to do it that way.

If he's charging extra to return, and your distribution board will handle it, I'd be inclined to run that circuit from a RCBO which you can plug in for yourself and save the money.

OP here: no extra charge. These outlets are on different breakers and I don't have room to add multiple RCBO's unfortunately.

This method is defiantly NOT TO CODE. It may well work, IF the house's main panel is also grounded to the water pipe, And IF all the connectors are still working. BUT -this is certainly not the way it should be done.

From the 05 copy of the NEC: (wiring) shall be connected together and to the supply system grounded equipment (Fuse or Breaker Panel) in a manner that creates a permanent, low-impedance path for ground-fault current that is capable of carrying the maximum fault current likely to be imposed on it.

What this means is that ALL grounding conductors (wires) are supposed to go back to the main supply point - the panel. PERIOD.

I have no idea what sort of "outlets" you had grounded, but if they were more than the typical 20 Amp branch outlet, this is certainly going to VERY problematic of something does arise.

Best answer - get someone to do it right - probably cost a lot more, but cheaper than a house fire.

I disagree with Oldfefan (Post #59). The method described is to code and acceptable (in Canada) if it is a retrofit situation in which existing ungrounded outlets are being grounded ("I had an electrician ground four outlets in my home." - original guest post), and it is impractical to run new wiring back to the panel. This is the situation Rule 26-700(8) of the Canadian Electrical Code addresses (see Post #13).

There could be an issue in the way the wiring was installed in the attic crawl space. According to Rule 12-514, nonmetallic sheathed cable "shall not be run on or across the upper faces of ceiling joists in attic or roof spaces where the vertical distance between the joists and the rafters exceeds one metre, unless suitably protected from mechanical injury". If the electrician used a single copper bonding conductor for the outlets (instead of non-metalic sheathed cable), it "shall be installed and protected in the same manner as the circuit conductor for a given installation" (Rule 10-808(5)).

Hi Again

Well I'm not at all familiar with the Canadian codes, but NEC 08 says:

250.52 Grounding Electrodes.
(A) Electrodes Permitted for Grounding.
(1) Metal Underground Water Pipe. ...<snip>... Interior metal water piping located more than 1.52 m (5 ft) from the point of entrance to the building shall not be used as a part of the grounding electrode system or as a conductor to interconnect electrodes that are part of the grounding electrode system.

VII. Methods of Equipment Grounding

250.130 Equipment Grounding Conductor Connections.

(A) For Grounded Systems. The connection shall be made by bonding the equipment grounding conductor to the grounded service conductor and the grounding electrode conductor.
(B) For Ungrounded Systems. The connection shall be made by bonding the equipment grounding conductor to the grounding electrode conductor.

(C) Nongrounding Receptacle Replacement or Branch Circuit Extensions. The equipment grounding conductor of a grounding-type receptacle or a branch-circuit extension shall be permitted to be connected to any of the following:

(1) Any accessible point on the grounding electrode system as described in 250.50
(2) Any accessible point on the grounding electrode conductor
(3) The equipment grounding terminal bar within the enclosure where the branch circuit for the receptacle or branch circuit originates

(4) For grounded systems, the grounded service conductor within the service equipment enclosure

(5) For ungrounded systems, the grounding terminal bar within the service equipment enclosure

========== end quote ============

Now the thing to note is this - even in the last case - of an UNgrounded system, the ground wire still must be brought back to the gnd terminal in the SE panel.

In all other cases, the grounded service conductor MUST be brought to the panel or to the "grounding electrode system". Yes, water pipes are often "bonded" or connected to the "grounding electrode system", but, they are not a part of the system. This is sort of splitting hairs, but - thats what my copy says. And as I interpret that, this particular "Branch Circuit Extensions" is not properly grounded.

The bonding method described in Rule 26-700(8) of the Canadian Electrical Code (see Post #13) is not accepted as standard practice in Canada. The Rule recognizes the impracticality of routing new conductors back to the panel to ground existing ungrounded outlets in old houses. In residential wiring, the most common upgrade from ungrounded to grounded receptacles is in the kitchen. In these situations, the C.E.C. allows bonding to "an adjacent grounded metal cold water pipe" (usually located under the kitchen sink).

This is not the preferred method, but the rule recognizes a reality: Most homeowners would choose not to make the upgrade if routing a new conductor back to the panel would result in expensive damage to interior finished surfaces.

So, I guess the allowance or disallowance of the described installation depends on geography.

Is the use of RCDs obligatory for kitchens in Canada? If so, the risk will be quite acceptable. If not, there is a risk that grounds will be bonded to pipework that eventually becomes disconnected from panel ground, and may become live in the event of an appliance fault.

As there will likely also be appliances that are grounded via panel ground accessible in the kitchen (electric hobs and ovens, for example) this would represent an unacceptable hazard.

In long, although I would be reasonably content with such an arrangement in a room where all available grounds were made in this way and bonded together, I would not countenance the practice of using different ground routes where there is any sensible chance that metalwork connected to two different grounds could be contacted simultaneously.

But maybe I'm misconstruing what you wrote?

Fyz

I completely understand your concern that the safety of bonding a kitchen receptacle to "an adjacent grounded cold water pipe" could be jeopardized if a section of the plumbing were to be replaced with plastic pipe. The Canadian Electrical Code has recently introduced GFCI requirements for certain kitchen receptacles. Possibly the current C.E.C. has amended Rule 26-700(8) which I quoted. The new C.E.C. edition costs $150., and downloading it is considered copyright infringement. I don't want to spend $150, and I also don't want to go to jail, so I have been unable to determine the current status of Rule 26-700(8). Maybe another poster can help.

One realistic case would be if the external pipe was ruptured and replaced with polyethylene. This is particularly common with old pipes that were buried at 3 feet, and where the soil has been eroded (or ploughed, landscaped or there has been infill building).

OP here: electrician re-grounded 4 receptacles to ground bar in panel. He also stapled ground wire in attic to joists this time. It was a little difficult to run ground wire to panel in my ranch house since the panel is on an outside wall. Electrician had to cut small hole in drywall above panel to feed ground wire. He removed original ground to cold water and I'm repairing drywall, which is no big deal. I feel more comfortable now knowing that I'm grounded to the panel. Thanks for everyone's advice on this matter!

"removed original ground to cold water"

What! Internationally, and without exception SFIK, the regulations assert that significant areas of exposed unrelated conductors shall be connected to ground. Where there have been changes in regulations, they only mean that you are not allowed to rely on the cold water connection to provide the ground; they do not mean that it is unnecessary to bond pipes and other conductors to ground.

Removal of grounds to piping means that these "exposed unrelated conductors" could now be (or in the future become) floating. Not a problem you might think? Perhaps not - until a faulty appliance or damaged section of cable touches the piping, at which point the whole section of pipe becomes live and you could easily connect yourself between the live pipes and the grounded case of a different appliance.

___________________________

A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again. (A. Pope - not "the", after possibly Petronius)

"removed original ground to cold water"

I think what the OP was talking about was the NEW ground run to the water pipe from the "Branch Circuit Extensions" that he the first Electrician put in. The one we have all been yakking about.

I'm sure he was - but there wouldn't have been another ground connection to this pipe in the area, so he needed to leave at least one of the added ones in place, or the attic pipes could become disconnected from ground following pipe replacement in other rooms or even outside the house. This is the reason behind the rules for local grounding of unrelated metalwork.

Please Guest...read the whole thread. We all, like, totally agree with you...

And why not join the CR4? Its not so difficult.

OP here: I don't have piping in the attic.

At least that is one area where you haven't added to the risk!

Is the cold water system your home bonded to ground in some other way?