Arc Flash Protection

Arc flash protection first became an issue of serious study in the early 1980s when in the IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications there appeared an article by Ralph Lee titled: “The Other Electrical Hazard: Electric Arc Blast Burns.” These early studies convinced several companies, particularly those in the petrochemical industry, that too many workers were suffering burn injuries from electrical safety incidents. A consequence was that several companies took steps to establish the first set of known practices designed to better protect employees and electrical personnel who were working on energized electrical equipment.

OSHA and NFPA 70E require equipment to be in an electrically safe work condition before employees work on or near it. Equipment, therefore, should be de-energized before any work is done that may result in an electrical arc flash being generated. In some cases, however, work cannot be done on de-energized systems as well as the fact that in order to provide the arc flash protection from an incident occurring the shut down of equipment must be done on energized sources.