Correctional Facility Electrical System

Make sure it can't be stolen! Come on there's got to be a story behind the question.

Anything to do with electrocution, you're on your own!

^Þ°ρ∂þ "....A friend in need, is a friend indeed. Using electricity to spring your buddy free..that's even better...."^Þ°ρ∂þ

I ran the paint and glass on one.

The only thing that involved electrical on my end, (on a US federal penitentiary), was that it was in my specs to paint marking stripes on every single piece of conduit in the electrical rooms.

It really sucked, and I got really up close and personal with the electrical blueprints.

Ok... the story is... I am doing a regulatory review of a design for a medium security facility. I wanted to hear from the members here with such experience, their view points on demand calculations.

This application does not clearly fit in with the other CEC Section 8 guidelines. The design seems under serviced. As such.. I was looking for opinions on minimum demands from a watts per square meter point of view for the "residential" portion of such a facility.

Ohhh in Canada... we have no death penalty.

Ok, my experience is: unlike multi-unit resi, all lights will be during the daytime, so lighting cannot be derated for diversity or demand factor, in fact it is a continuous load rated at 125%. Do you have an onsite laundry, thats also a continouus load. Kitchen can be derated as a "new restaurant" . HVAC should not be derated. BTW, you know about the special requirements for "resident" access areas, those should be in the SOW.

Yes I have some experience.. what do you need to know?

If there any others like me, then we will not discuss things of security.

Surprised you asked this question as there are security firms, sworn to secrecy, that handle these matters.

and Jack is right, which is why I only discussed general questions about demand or diversity loads :)

Jack and Capy

While you are of course correct, and if you have signed a NDA and any other security document then yes, you don't discuss, as it is a federal offence. However I am not bound by such restrictions... also I'm very curious to know what those questions will be!

As stated already... my questions revolve on minimum demand, in watts, for the cell area and common inmate areas. All of major power loads (HVAC mechanical and kitchen loads) have all been adequately addressed in the current published load calc.

The designer is proposing a base demand of 20 watts per sq meter, yet wishes to allow a diversity factor on that demand.

The 20 watt value comes from current CEC Section 8 guidelines from the base demand calculations for the lodging areas of hotels and dormitories. I question if this is adequate. What are we seeing in the way of load growth in the residential areas of such facilities? And as for the diversity factor... nope.

They also have no allowance, as seen in other such projects, for the special nature of the lighting systems used in the general & residential areas. On some such designs, I have seen an allowance as high as 2 watts per sq meter added to the base demand in these areas for the lighting.

Security systems are outside of my area of interest. My only concern is the safety of the deployed electrical system. Whether or not the facility after being built, was built as it needed to be built (as a correctional facility), is not my worry.

Most every country has specific requirements associated with how a correctional facility has to be built and even operated, before asking for information, please look into the judicial departments, ministries, etc., on what their particular requirements are, they will help you define the true needs of any institution.

For example in some countries there is no electricity, rather they keep the prisoners in the dark, in others they have even convenience outlets in every cell. So look at the proper requirements before addressing what you want to look for, you may be surprised at the simplicity and / or complexity of it.

Agreed... I have initiated such discussions with the corrections people to get a handle on what they will be allowing inmates to plug in to the receptacles in the cells and in the common areas inside the secure area.

They have provisioned as many as 4 x 5-15 120V 15 amp receptacles, which allows for up to 8 devices to be plugged in, in each cell.

4 x 120 x 15 ÷ 20 = 360 m²/cell? That seems pretty generous, like Norway or someplace.

The cells are just over 10 sq meters in size. At 20w per sq meter... that works out to a little over 204 watts. Not much... considering the outlets being provisioned.

Are you involved in/designing a prison or holiday camp?

Outlets in the cell?

In the UK they get a light, no switch, no outlets.....

I am not designing anything. I am a regulator. I must approve or reject a design submitted by the engineer of record.

As to the nature of the build with respect to outlets in the cells... not my place to comment upon. Though I agree with you it is a tad overkill

'....For example in some countries there is no electricity....'

.

Yeah, but the OP is not in Louisiana.... most places in Canada qualify as 1st world.

This thread reminds me of someone who once worked for me. He had been the head of a maintenace crew in a huge penitentiary. The crew was all prisoners. He had lots of tales of naive things that designers of the system and the prisoners did. He left us to go to work for one of our customers and now heads up the electrical group of one of the largest Casino-resort-hotel complexes in the world. I mean to ask him, what the comparison of his current employees and associates to his prison crew is.

Bottom line, you need to get everything in writing as far as standards pertaining to this question. I am sure that the authorities have a lot in writing regarding this that go way beyond the standards and you need it all. Any document referenced should be investigated. All contracts involved should be read. You must understand it all. This really is no different from any other job. You cannot get the total picture from anyone else. You can use their experience to avoid certain things that could be avoided but they can't relieve you from the work you must do to research everything.

Agreed...

However... the things you mentioed in your 2nd parragraph are not my concerns. Those are the concerns of the designers of this facility. I am not the designer.

I am an electrical safety regulator. My need is to decide if the suggested design is safe or not... period. An under provisioned main serivce is not safe.

Whether or not it meets the need of the corrections people is not my concern. Whether or not the designers have taken into consideration all of the standards that may apply to such a facility is also not my concern. As to the "total picture", also not my concern. My concern is limited to the electrical safety of the electrical design and nothing more.

The design is safe?

would that be the design of the circuits or the light fittings etc?

It would be the total service for the facility. They based the demand for the cells and common areas of the secure areas on the value of 20 watts per square meter.

The main service was provisioned with that in mind. My concern is... is the 20 watts per square meter enough?

The way to look at it is in two parts. Inside and outside

Inside.... lights on most of the day, not a lot of power being used by inmates for computers in cells, but in training/classrooms yes, and the admin blocks

Outside.... no lights during daylight hours

However that all changes at dusk, lights on inside and outside, and maybe higher consumption for the outside lights. At about 8pm lights out for the inmates and the outside lights stay on until dawn.

As you or someone said diversity cannot be used, but you can calculate almost to the watt how much power each building or block will used by the number of lights and the time those lights will be on!

As for design of fixtures and fittings.... there is no such thing as "Con proof". There will NEVER be an outlet in the cell, so the "Con" will try to get power from the cell light fitting or the fire alarm circuit.... you can imagine the effect!

LOL... they will not have to steal power from the lights as they are putting 3 and 4 duplex receptacles (6 & 8 plug in points) in each cell (there are two types of cells).

Hello again. I know nothing of Canada, however I would expect it would not be too different from Australia in this respect. Here in Aus, we have a set of standards, They are, naturally called Australian and New Zealand standards. (as & nzs). When an architect puts out a design for any building, they all to be followed and quoted as such. Most times these standards are copied from other designs that are for a capital city and must be taken back to the architect to be varied for country conditions. For example. On the television side of the project we are told to receive channels 2, 7, 9, 10. These are city channels and even under almost perfect reception weather are not able to be received over 100 miles away. We go to the designer and tell him the local channels are E.G. 1, 6, 8. This is then altered to suit. Surely you have a set of standards to operate from?

Agreed... But... as I mentioned earlier, the consideration of any such mandated design standards is up to the design enginner and not me. My only concern is that the proposed design is code compliant with the adopted electrical code in this jurisdiction, which is the 2012 version of the Canadian Electrical Code, other wise know as C22.2-2012.

Correction...

The code in force is "CSA C22.1-2012" and not what I had above.

20W/m² may not be enough for Old Sparky

_{I'm surprised this didn't come up sooner from our mob here}

One of my co-workers was called by the state of Alabama to check one of these that failed to execute a prisoner. How do you test one? He looked at it and found a damaged connection by visual inspection, had them repair that, but as far as I know it was never used again.

'How do you test one?'

.

Initially, I think concept was demonstrated on an elephant. Something related to the current wars, if I haven't been mislead by flights of fancy.

to answer the OP's question, although i dont know canadian code.....but as for safety, 20w/m^2 is a very adequate load, and not a violation of NEC. any load is safe if wired and breakered correctly. generally, "residents" are not allowed cooking, toasters, coffee makers, microwaves, etc in their cells. i assume this is for "resident" cells, not laundries, kitchens, central HVAC, etc.

the main issue we had is to require all wiring to be inaccessible to "residents." and of course, proper "critical power" (backup generator or UPS) must be provided so that electrical disruptions in utility power do not created safety issues for employees or "residents." im surprised any receptacles are allowed in cells at all, they werent in the last jail i wired, but that depends on the security level (min, medium, max) of the facility.

What you need to find are the code books for the minimum requirements for a correctional facility. I worked in a US State correctional facility and had to go through a periodic inspection by an outside group that ensured the minimum requirement of lighting, space, security, education (and everything else under the sun, include how much sunlight they were exposed to). There in you will find the minimum requirements for electrical needs. Your builder should be using those to build from. If he isn't you can have all kinds of fun with that.

Good Luck! I don't recall what the name of the code is in the US, I have been away from there for 8 years (thank goodness).