ASPE Design Standards Committee Update

by David D. Dexter, PE, CPD

It has been awhile since I last reported to the membership on the status of ASPE’s design standards. After spending time on project sites, reviewing the contractor’s work and comparing that work to the contract documents, it is easy to see the need for standards. Standards assist everyone in producing better designs, designs based on sound engineering principles while meeting and exceeding the minimums set by code.

The Main Standards Committee (MSC) and its true developers, the working groups (WGs), are hard at work on their respective standards. Presently, the MSC is reviewing a standard for siphonic roof drainage. Next, the MSC hopes to begin review of a standard on hot water temperature and control. During the next several months, the MSC plans to advance these standards into the ANSI (American National Standards Institute) process, publishing and offering these documents to the industry. The MSC and ASPE will then begin working toward code recognition of these ANSI-recognized standards.

Other WGs continue the development of standards for water line sizing, venting systems, and plumbing system commissioning. The members of these WGs spend many hours working to advance the profession and enhance the public’s health and safety through application of sound engineering principles. Codes should be based on those principles. However, much that is contained within the code text today is based on past experience, personal agendas, economic self-interests, or “that is how my grandfather always did it.” The last three items do not belong in any code. The sole purpose of codes should be to protect the public’s health and safety, not promote some material or system or require excessive labor. The limiting of new methods, materials, or systems by poorly conceived codes wastes limited resources costing the building industry time and money and damaging the profession’s creditability.

In today’s fast-paced world, with ever-changing requirements and rapid innovation, standards give the design, installation, and enforcement communities a common basis to develop, install, and assure that the code minimum has been met. Standards are the accumulation of the vast knowledge of our industry, applied through sound engineering principles and developed into a written consensus document for all to apply. 

Standards do not just happen. They are developed through the tireless effort of a few dedicated individuals. Freely giving of their limited time, a small group of dedicated individuals are continuing their work on making the profession better for our peers, enhancing the profession, while improving the public’s health and safety. But, as many of us who accepted the challenge of standard development are learning, it is a long-term commitment requiring dedication and a fair amount of time. Each member of the WGs and the MSC remain dedicated to completing the current standards and moving the tasks into the ANSI process and code arena.

As these standards are completed, the WGs will continue their work on reviewing and updating the standard they developed. This is and will remain an ongoing process. While the current set of standards leave the MSC for ANSI and code acceptance, others will be started. This is where the membership, code officials, engineers/designers, tradesmen, the public, and other interested parties need to be involved. They need to recommend standards that ASPE and the MSC should consider for development. And, as these other standards are considered, those interested, dedicated volunteers need to step forward. It is through those dedicated and hardworking individuals that this process moves forward. What standards do you believe ASPE and the MSC should be considering? Are you willing to step forward and become involved in this dynamic and exciting process? Yes, it does take time and commitment, but it is time to stop expecting someone else to develop standards that are needed. It is time to step up and help advance the profession. To paraphrase President John F. Kennedy, “Don’t ask what your Society can do for you, but what you can do for your Society and profession.”