The plumbing provisions of The International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials (IAPMO) Green Plumbing and Mechanical Code Supplement (GPMCS) will be included as an Appendix to the 2012 edition of the National Standard Plumbing Code published by the Plumbing Heating Cooling Contractors (PHCC) – National Association.

The National Standard Plumbing Code Committee voted unanimously to incorporate the provisions from the GPMCS in order to provide a needed resource to plumbers, engineers, installers, contractors and code officials tasked with designing, installing, inspecting or adopting sustainable plumbing systems. The New Jersey PHCC Chapter and the New Jersey Chapter of the American Society of Plumbing Engineers offered testimony in support of the proposed change.

The GPMCS was developed as a tool to be used as an overlay to any plumbing code, including the NSPC. It provides code officials with comprehensive and progressive enforceable green code provisions that help eliminate base line code barriers and provide the critical information needed to assure that the sustainable construction practices being incentivized by green rating programs such as USGBC’s LEED and Green Building Initiative’s Green Globes are safe and reliable. Hence, the incorporation of the GPMCS into the NSPC Appendix precisely fulfills the vision IAPMO stakeholders embraced while developing the GPMCS.

The building codes are perhaps the biggest hindrance to the construction of green buildings,” said Dave Viola, IAPMO director of Special Services and staff liaison to the Green Technical Committee (GTC) that developed the GPMCS. “The NSPC Committee took a huge step in eliminating these barriers by making available to NSPC code users the very best in sustainable plumbing code provisions.”

With the addition of the GPMCS, the 2012 NSPC will contain energy and water conservation measures, efficient hot water system design criteria and provisions addressing the safe design, installation and maintenance of alternate water source systems, including harvested rainwater, gray water and reclaimed water for commercial and residential buildings. The NSPC is adopted and enforced in the States of Maryland and New Jersey.

The industry made it clear that a need exists for consensus-based code language that provides needed direction for water and energy saving in the built environment,” said Sean Cleary, IAPMO field manager. “The IAPMO Green Plumbing and Mechanical Code Supplement inclusion into the NSPC Appendix provides prescriptive industry language that will allow adopting jurisdictions to be at the forefront of Green Building within the United States.”


Source: IAPMO