DESIGN ALERT ON HVAC DESIGN MANUAL
FOR REGIONAL OFFICE BUILDINGS
1. On page 17, under paragraph 3.7 "Emergency Electrical Power" paragraph B is
being deleted. This calls for "Heating equipment as required by NFPA 99, where
outside winter design temperature is 20 deg. F or less". NFPA 99 is applicable to health
care facilities only. Therefore, this code is not applicable to an office type building. I am
not aware of any NFPA code requirement which calls for heating system of an office
building to be on emergency power. Therefore, please do not try to enforce this
requirement on office buildings.
2. Question was raised by Jawahar Chaudhary (185B) on requiring smoke dampers in
ducts crossing smoke barriers for an office building. Ken Faulstich (138) says NFPA
does not address any requirement for smoke barriers in business occupancies, so
there would be no smoke dampers involved. However, in case there are any smoke
barriers involved for some reason, then duct mounted smoke detectors and smoke
dampers at the crossing of these barriers can be deleted provided the building is fully
sprinklered with quick response sprinkler heads. Irrespective of this issue, requirement
of NFPA 90A must be implemented in office buildings, which requires smoke dampers
to be installed at the air handling units larger than 15,000 CFM serving more than one
story for isolating the system from circulation of smoke.
FOR ADDITIONAL INFOR MATION:
Contact Satish Sehgal at 202.565.5032 in the Standards Service (187C).
28 March 1994
FM-187C-DA2
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