Author Archives: mike@standardsmichigan.com

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Bach Brandenburg Concerto III

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Johann Sebastian Bach’s six Brandenburg Concertos (1719–1721) celebrate instrumental color, virtuosity, and joyful invention. Dedicated to the Margrave of Brandenburg, they showcase wildly diverse ensembles (from solo violin to trumpets, flutes, and horns) in a spirit of exuberant experimentation rarely heard before.  Unlike heavier Baroque works, their lightness, clarity, and forward energy gently lift the mind and spirit—ideal for shaking off sleep and greeting the day.
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Home | Spokane County

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Water and Fire

Tradition is tending the flame, not worshiping the ashes.”
— Gustav Mahler

Well Water

Water and Sanitation

“Kettle’s On” & Morning Shower

International Plumbing Code

Fireplace Safety

NFPA 70 Article 90

Today we review a draft of an article that covers, in our view, an obvious oversight in the 2026 National Electrical Code.  It is an expansion of a proposal already submitted to the National Electrical Code Technical Correlating Committee and will support challenges to its adoption into the 2029 NEC revision.  Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.


Restore the NESC to the Front End of the NEC

Michael A. Anthony | Glenn T. Keates 

Abstract. It may seem like a small thing — to restore the cross-reference to the IEEE National Electrical Safety Code (NESC) at the front end of the NFPA National Electrical Code (NEC) where it used to be — but it is not. This paper explains why restoration of the NEC’s peer document is necessary in the 2029 Edition of the NEC, now under development.

The reasons are both technical and cultural, touching on a minefield of sensitivities about safety, sustainability, and economic development associated with the data center (artificial intelligence) zeitgeist. 

Customer owned interactive sources are not new.  Customer-owned load-side electric services at transmission voltages for private developers and university-adjacent hyperscale installations present consideration are new.[x] 

The NESC, in contrast, maintains a clear “handshake” reference to the NEC in its Scope statement (Section 011). This paper argues for the restoration of a prominent NESC cross-reference in NEC Article 90.2(A)(2) for the 2029 edition. The proposal (Public Input No. 3687-NFPA 70-2026) has already been submitted to NFPA Technical Committee CMP-1.

2029 National Electrical Code

NESC 2028 Comments

Mike Anthony and University of Michigan Electrical Engineer Colleagues

Glenn Keates with University of Michigan IEEE Students during March 2026 Scoreboard Tour

Canadian Parliament Debate on Standards Incorporated by Reference

What happened to Canada?

“The Jack Pine” | Tom Thomson (1916) | National Gallery of Canada

 

Originally posted January 2014

In these clips — selected from Canadian Parliamentary debate in 2013 — we observe three points of view about Incorporation by reference (IBR); a legislative drafting technique that is the act of including a second document within a main document by referencing the second document.

This technique makes an entire second (or referenced) document a part of the main document.  The consensus documents in which we advocate #TotalCostofOwnership concepts are incorporated by reference into legislation dealing with safety and sustainability at all levels of government.  This practice — which many consider a public-private partnership — is a more effective way of driving best practices for technology, and the management of technology, into regulated industries.

Parent legislation — such as the Higher Education Act of 1965, the Clean Air Act and the Energy Policy Act – almost always require intermediary bureaucracies to administer the specifics required to accomplish the broad goals of the legislation.  With the gathering pace of governments everywhere expanding their influence over larger parts of the technologies at the foundation of national economies; business and technology standards are needed to secure that influence.  These standards require competency in the application of political, technical and financial concepts; competencies that can only be afforded by incumbent interests who build the cost of their advocacy into the price of the product or service they sell to our industry.  Arguably, the expansion of government is a reflection of the success of incumbents in business and technical standards; particularly in the compliance and conformity industries.

About two years ago, the US debate on incorporation by reference has been taken to a new level with the recent statement released by the American Bar Association (ABA):

16-164-Incorporation-by-Reference-ABA-Resolution-and-Report

The American National Standards Institute responded to the ABA with a statement of its own.

16-164-ANSI-Response-to-ABA-IBR-06-16 (1)

The incorporation by reference policy dilemma has profound implications for how we safely and economically design, operate and maintain our “cities-within-cities” in a sustainable manner but, admittedly, the results are only visible in hindsight over a time horizon that often exceed the tenure of a typical college or university president.

A recent development — supporting the claims of ANSI and its accredited standards developers — is noteworthy:

The National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) manages a website — Standards.GOV — that is a single access point for consensus standards incorporated by reference into the Code of Federal Regulations: Standards Incorporated by Reference Database.   Note that this database does not include specific reference to safety and sustainability codes which are developed by standards setting organizations (such as NFPA, ICC, IEEE, ASHRAE and others) and usually incorporated by reference into individual state public safety and technology legislation.


LEARN MORE:

 

https://www.gvsu.edu/gvnext/2020/decades-long-gvsu-tree-swallow-study-continually-benefits-science-students.htm

Quadrivium: Spring

ANSI Standards Action May 22, 2026 Bulletin Board

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Our use of the term “Educational Settlements” captures the self-contained energy of these places — kindergartens, classrooms, quads, dining halls, dorms, and nearby squares buzzing with student life amid broader higher-ed shifts like the “demographic cliff” (declining traditional enrollments), AI integration, skills-focused curricula, and financial pressures.  (Related: Agora)

The Stanford Review: Marry Young

A Better Life: Lionel Shriver

Macdonald-Laurier Institute: How to Reverse Collapsing Birth Rates

Trending | Engagements, Weddings & Births | Sport News | Carillons

MORE

Starting 2026 we will organize our weekly syllabi in a less structured but in a more time sensitive manner.  Stay tuned.

Athenian Agora and Acropolis

 

https://standardsmichigan.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=75791&action=edit#visibility

“…O chestnut tree;, great rooted blossomer,
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bold?
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance?”

Among Schoolchildren, 1933 William Butler Yeats

We sweep through the world’s three major time zones; updating our understanding of the literature at the technical foundation of education community safety and sustainability in those time zones 24 times per day. We generally eschew “over-coding” web pages to sustain speed, revision cadence and richness of content as peak priority.  We do not provide a search facility because of copyrights of publishers and time sensitivity of almost everything we do.

Readings:

“The Advancement of Learning” Francis Bacon (1605)

“The Allegory of the Cave” 380 BCE | Plato’s Republic, Book VII

Thucydides: Pericles’ Funeral Oration

IEEE Access: Advanced Deep Learning Models for 6G: Overview, Opportunities, and Challenges | Xidian University

“Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination” (2002) Peter Ackroyd

“Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” Satoshi Nakamoto

“Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds” (1841) | Charles Mackay

Cognitive Science: An Introduction to the Study of Mind

“Kant’s Categorical Imperative” | Hillsdale College Introduction to Western Philosophy

“The Natural History of Stupidity” (1959) Paul Tabori

“The College Idea: Andrew Delbanco” Lapham’s Quarterly

Distributed Representations of Words and Phrases and their Compositionality | Google, Inc. et, al

Our daily colloquia are typically doing sessions; with non-USA titles receiving priority until 16:00 UTC and all other titles thereafter.  We assume policy objectives are established (Safer-Simpler-Lower-Cost, Longer-Lasting).   Because we necessarily get into the weeds, and because much of the content is time-sensitive and copyright protected, we usually schedule a separate time slot to hammer on technical specifics so that our response to consultations are meaningful and contribute to the goals of the standards developing organization and to the goals of stewards of education community real assets — typically the largest real asset owned by any US state and about 50 percent of its annual budget.

1. Leviathan.  We track noteworthy legislative proposals in the United States 118th Congress.  Not many deal specifically with education community real assets since the relevant legislation is already under administrative control of various Executive Branch Departments such as the Department of Education.

We do not advocate in legislative activity at any level.   We respond to public consultations but there it ends.

We track federal legislative action because it provides a stroboscopic view of the moment — the “national conversation”– in communities that are simultaneously a business and a culture.  Even though more than 90 percent of such proposals are at the mercy of the party leadership the process does enlighten the strengths and weakness of a governance system run entirely through the counties on the periphery of Washington D.C.  It is impossible to solve technical problems in facilities without sensitivity to the zietgeist that has accelerated in education communities everywhere.

Michigan Great Lake Quilt

Michigan can 100% water and feed itself.  Agriculture is its second-largest industry.

2National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

3. American National Standards Institute (ANSI)

4. Fast Forward  

The Year Ahead 2026

5. Rewind

Retrodiction

Lights Out

6. Corrigenda

 

“The world will never starve for want of wonders;

but only for want of wonder.”

–  G.K Chesterton, The Spirit of Christmas (1905)

 

Mike Anthony with colleagues since 1982 @ UM Ross School of Business Executive Dining Room

 

Bulletin Board

NIST | USPTO | ANSI | IEEE | ICC | ASTM | ASHRAE | UL | TIA | ASME | ASCE | AGA

Michigan Standards Developers : NSF | ACI | NETA | ASABE | HL7 | RIA | JCSEE | BIFMA | PJRFSI | SAE

Global: SA | BSA | NSAI | CSA | CEN & CENELEC | ISO & IEC*


 

APPA was founded at the University of Michigan| See our ABOUT

 

 


* ISO and IEC have opted out of the X-social media platforms.  FYI: X is 13 times the size of BlueSky in terms of scale and reach.

Current Issues & Recent Research

“The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena,

it will make more progress in one decade

than in all the previous centuries of existence.”

—  Nikola Tesla

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Restore NESC Cross-Reference to the Front End of the NEC

Electrical Power System Research

SUMMER SESSION (TBD): “How to Finance, Design, Renovate, Build and Operate an Enterprise Data Center”

NFPA Electrical Standards Landing Page  Ω NFPA Standards Council  Ω NFPA Fire Safety Landing Page

ASHRAE Landing PageASTM Electrical & ElectronicsIES Illumination

Draft IEEE Paper AbstractsMike Anthony Short Biography | Electrotechnology OEMS

 IEEE Education & Healthcare Facilities Committee Recent Meeting Minutes 

Michigan Stadium Scoreboard Tour | March 18

NEC & NESC Crosswalk

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IEEE Southeastern Michigan Section Welcome August 2024

 

 

IEEE & SWE Student Tour of Michigan Stadium Scoreboard | April 2024

IEEE SEM Student Activity 2025

Trending

Electrical Power System Research

NFPA Electrical Standards Landing Page  Ω NFPA Standards Council  Ω NFPA Fire Safety Landing Page

ASHRAE Landing PageASTM Electrical & Electronics

Draft IEEE Paper AbstractsMike Anthony Short Biography | Electrotechnology OEMS

We examine the proposals for the 2028 National Electrical Safety Code; including our own. The 2026 National Electrical Code where sit on CMP-15 overseeing health care facility electrical issues should be released any day now. We have one proposal on the agenda of the International Code Council’s Group B Committee Action Hearings in Cleveland in October. Balloting on the next IEEE Gold Book on reliability should begin.

“Tomorrow’s Girls” | Donald Fagan

Policy:

OUTERNET: Crossing over data gap using cubesats

Department of Energy Portfolio Analysis & Management System

Department of Energy Building Technologies Office

FERC Open Meetings | (Note that these ~60 minute sessions meet Sunshine Act requirements.  Our interest lies one or two levels deeper into the technicals underlying the administrivia)

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Federal Communication Commission Michigan Public Service Commission
December 18 Open Meeting December 5 Open Meeting
August 7 Open Meeting
July 24 Open Meeting July 25 Open Meeting
June 16 Open Meeting January 22: Newly Appointed FCC Chairman Announces Staff Changes June  12 Open Meeting
May 15 Open Meeting May 15 Open Meeting
April 17 Open Meeting April 24 Open Meeting
March 20 Open Meeting
February 20 FERC Open Meeting March 3 Open Meeting
January 16 FERC Press Conference February 27, 2025 Open Meeting

January 23: NARUC Congratulates New FERC, FCC and NRC Chairs

January 22: Newly Appointed FCC Chairman Announces Staff Changes | Related: Falsus in uno, Falsus in omnibus

January 6: City of Ann Arbor Postpones Phase II Study to Municipalize DTE Energy distribution grid

January 27, 10 AM Low-Income Energy Policy Board Meeting: Michigan Public Service commission

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission: January 16, 2025 Open Meeting

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Notice of Request for Comments (Posted November 25, 2024)

Interregional Transfer Capability Study: Strengthening Reliability Through the Energy Transformation Docket No. AD25-4-000

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission | November 21, Open Meeting

Press Conference

Michigan Public Service Commission Meetings

Michigan Public Commission Meeting  February 27, 2025

MPSC DTE CMS Electric Power Reliability Case No. U-21305

Michigan Electrical Administrative Board Meeting February 13, 2025

FCC Open Meeting | November 21 

[Mike Anthony Opinion] on the gales of innuendo against limited federal government voices in federally financed National Public Radio

National Infrastructure Advisory Council: Addressing the Critical Shortage of Power Transformers to Ensure Reliability of the U.S. Grid

H.R. 9603 (September 16): To amend the Federal Power Act to prohibit the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission from issuing permits for the construction or modification of electric transmission facilities in a State over the objection of the State, and for other purposes.

Technical: (Also Electrical Power System Research)

Empower Pre-Trained Large Language Models for Building-Level Load Forecasting

Uptime Institute (via NEXT DC) : AI Inference in the Data Center

Majorana Nanowires for Topological Quantum Computing

Linearized Data Center Workload and Cooling Management

Lex Fridman: DeepSeek, China, OpenAI, NVIDIA, xAI, TSMC, Stargate, and AI Megaclusters 

IEEE: Experts Weigh in on $500B Stargate Project for AI

IEEE: AI Mistakes Are Very Different Than Human Mistakes .  We need new security systems designed to deal with their weirdness

High-Performance Tensor Learning Primitives Using GPU Tensor Cores

Department of Electrical Engineering, Columbia University, New York

Causes and Consequences of Widespread Power Blackout Across Taiwan on 3 March 2022: A Blackout Incident Investigation in the Taiwan Power System

Department of Electrical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei City, Taiwan

 

First Draft Proposals contain most of our proposals — and most new (original) content.  We will keep the transcripts linked below but will migrate them to a new page starting 2025:

Electrical Safety

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-1

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-2

Public Input Report CMP-3

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-4

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-5

Public Input Report CMP-6

Public Input Report CMP-7

Public Input Report CMP-8

Public Input Report CMP-9

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-10

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-11

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-12

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-13

Public Input Report CMP-14

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-15

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-16

Public Input Report CMP-17

2026 NEC Standards Michigan proposals | Public Input Report CMP-18

Related:

2026 National Electrical Code

N.B. We are in the process of migrating electric power system research to the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers bibliographic format. 


Recap of the May meetings of the  Industrial & Commercial Power Systems Conference in Las Vegas.  The conference ended the day before the beginning of the 3-day Memorial Day weekend in the United States so we’re pressed for time; given all that happened.

We can use our last meeting’s agenda to refresh the status of the issues.

IEEE E&H Draft Agenda 28 May 2024

On site conference agenda:

IEEE E&H Conference Agenda 21 May 2024

NESC & NEC Cross-Code Correlation

We typically break down our discussion into the topics listed below:

Codes & Standards:

While IAS/I&CPS has directed votes on the NEC; Mike is the only I&CPS member who is actually submitting proposals and responses to codes and standards developers to the more dominant SDO’s — International Code Council, ASHRAE International, UL, ASTM International, IEC & ISO.  Mike maintains his offer to train the next generation of “code writers and vote getters”

Performance-based building premises feeder design has been proposed for the better part of ten NEC revision cycles.  The objective of these proposals is to reduce material, labor and energy waste owed to the branch and feeder sizing rules that are prescriptive in Articles 210-235.  Our work in service and lighting branch circuit design has been largely successful.  A great deal of building interior power chain involves feeders — the network upstream from branch circuit panels but down stream from building service panel.

Our history of advocating for developing this approach, inspired by the NFPA 101 Guide to Alternative Approaches to Life Safety, and recounted in recent proposals for installing performance-based electrical feeder design into the International Building Code, appears in the link below:

Access to this draft paper for presentation at any conference that will receive it — NFPA, ICC or IEEE (or even ASHRAE) will be available for review at the link below:

Toward Performance-Based Building Premise Feeder Design

 

NFPA 110 Definitions of Public Utility v. Merchant Utility

NFPA 72 “Definition of Dormitory Suite” and related proposals

Buildings:

Renovation economics, Smart contracts in electrical construction.  UMich leadership in aluminum wiring statements in the NEC should be used to reduce wiring costs.

Copper can’t be mined fast enough to electrify the United States

Daleep asked Mike to do a Case Study session on the NEC lighting power density change (NEC 220-14) for the IAS Annual Meeting in October.  Mike agreed.

Exterior Campus & Distribution:

Illumination.  Gary Fox reported that IEEE 3001.9 was endorsed as an ANSI accredited standard for illumination systems.

2024-ICPSD24-0012 PERMANENT DESIGN OF POWER SYSTEMS Parise

This paper details primary considerations in estimating the life cycle of a campus medium voltage distribution grid.   Some colleges and universities are selling their entire power grid to private companies.  Mike has been following these transactions but cannot do it alone.

Variable Architecture Multi-Island Microgrids

District energy:

Generator stator winding failures and implications upon insurance premiums.  David Shipp and Sergio Panetta.  Mike suggests more coverage of retro-fit and lapsed life cycle technicals for insurance companies setting premiums.

Reliability:

Bob Arno’s leadership in updating the Gold Book.

Mike will expand the sample set in Table 10-35, page 293 from the <75 data points in the 1975 survey to >1000 data points.   Bob will set up meeting with Peyton at US Army Corps of Engineers.

Reliability of merchant utility distribution systems remains pretty much a local matter.  The 2023 Edition of the NESC shows modest improvement in the vocabulary of reliability concepts.  For the 2028 Edition Mike submitted several proposals to at least reference IEEE titles in the distribution reliability domain.   It seems odd (at least to Mike) that the NESC committees do not even reference IEEE technical literature such as Bob’s Gold Book which has been active for decades.  Mike will continue to propose changes in other standards catalogs — such as ASTM, ASHRAE and ICC — which may be more responsive to best practice assertions.  Ultimately, improvements will require state public utility commission regulations — and we support increases in tariffs so that utilities can afford these improvements.

Mike needs help from IEEE Piscataway on standard WordPress theme limitations for the data collection platform.

Mike will update the campus power outage database.

Healthcare:

Giuseppe Parise’s recent work in Italian power grid to its hospitals, given its elevated earthquake risk.  Mike’s review of Giuseppe’s paper:

Harvard Business School: Journal of Healthcare Management Standards

Mike and David Shipp will prepare a position paper for the Harvard Healthcare Management Journal on reliability advantages of impedance grounding for the larger systems.

The Internet of Bodies

Forensics:

Giuseppe’s session was noteworthy for illuminating the similarity and differences between the Italian and US legal system in handling electrotechnology issues.

Mike will restock the committee’s library of lawsuits transactions.

Ports:

Giuseppe updates on the energy and security issues of international ports.  Mike limits his time in this committee even though the State of Michigan has the most fresh water international ports in the world.

A PROPOSED GUIDE FOR THE ENERGY PLAN AND ELECTRICAL INFRASTRUCTURE OF A PORT

Other:

Proposals to the 2028 National Electrical Safety Code: Accepted Best Practice, exterior switchgear guarding, scope expansion into ICC and ASHRAE catalog,

Apparently both the Dot Standards and the Color Books will continue parallel development.  Only the Gold Book is being updated; led by Bob Arno.  Mike admitted confusion but reminded everyone that any references to IEEE best practice literature in the NFPA catalog, was installed Mike himself (who would like some backup help)

Universities with Quantum Computing Facilities

Papers in Process:

Impedance Grounding Papers 1 and 2 with David Shipp.  Previous Discussion:

https://ieeetv.ieee.org/channels/ieee-region-events/uc-berkeley-s-medium-voltage-grounding-system

Over Coffee and Beers:

Mike assured Christel Hunter (General Cable) that his proposals for reducing the 180 VA per-outlet requirements, and the performance-base design allowance for building interior feeders do not violate the results of the Neher-McGrath calculation used for conductor sizing.  All insulation and conducting material thermal limits are unaffected.

Other informal discussions centered on the rising cost of copper wiring and the implications for the global electrotechnical transformation involving the build out of quantum computing and autonomous vehicles.  Few expressed optimism that government ambitions for the same could be met in any practical way.

Are students avoiding use of Chat GPT for energy conservation reasons?  Mike will be breaking out this topic for a dedicated standards inquiry session:

GPT Power Grid

Education & Healthcare Facility Electrotechnology Committee

Workspace IEEE 1366: Guide for Electric Power Distribution Reliability Indices

Largest U.S. Electric Utility Companies Ranked by Generation Capacity  For IEEE 493 update we seek outage data from the 100 largest campus power system experts.

Alumni Memorial Hall 1908

Michigan Central

Vogue: Beaux Arts Architecture | Donaldson and Meier Architects

Alumni Memorial Hall was built as a war memorial and multi-purpose alumni building — not originally as an art museum; though it became — and still is — a gathering point for alumni who donated their collections to the University.  Its inspiration originated in 1864 shortly after the Civil War, to honor University of Michigan students, faculty, and alumni who died in that conflict and all conflicts thereafter.


 

Cultural Resource Properties

Museum Collections Security

Sacred Spaces

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