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While the case has already been made for a sole ISBP outdoors, we can make a whole new argument for having more than one ISBP indoors.
Unchanging assumptions and facts that support multiple indoor ISBPs include:
While it is true that all services to a facility make their way indoors to occupants, it remains more likely that they are never integrated because services are seized and released by occupants as desired. This "one service" focus is natural because no one provider supplies the services under discussion here.
The consumer, a person, becomes the provider.
The consumer is thus empowered to integrate incoming services at the facility. The consumer, possibly an owner or facility manager, must choose to integrate services with ISBP and to coordinate as necessary with the entity responsible for engineering supervision and control.
If a consumer can engineer an ISBP solution prior to constructing the facility by including it in the plans and designs, then one (1) ISBP can be properly built outdoors. But, the consumer must think of this in time to act.
An indoor ISBP can be convenient, inexpensive, and simple.
An indoor ISBP that handles as many as 13 services would intimidate any consumer responsible for obtaining one. It would be simpler to tailor the indoor ISBP to integrate only the systems in the immediate vicinity of the occupant.
For example, electrical service, cable TV service, telephone service, radio reception service, and audio-video-home entertainment services are commonly found in the home, and could be found in many rooms of a facility. Of course, AM-FM/TV reception and audio-video-home entertainment services are not as visible to the average consumer, and could be neglected by mistake.
An indoor ISBP focusing on only the commonly used systems would be cheap for the consumer and easy to produce in-house.
The ISBP must not only integrate system bonding and grounding in order to be relied upon by the consumer, but it must also be practical in order to motivate the consumer to use it. Such a practical device must be easily plugged in and connected, then left in place by the consumer.
An indoor ISBP should include the means for plugging in to an electrical outlet as well as for integrating common houselhold connectors such as F-type cable TV coaxial connectors and RJ-11 telephone plugs.
The ISBP must pass through the service, such as electrical power (if a built-in outlet is provided), cable TV, telephone, antenna signals, and audio-video-home entertainment signals.
The consumer can easily build an indoor ISBP that supports common services.
Materials are readily available and inexpensive to obtain. A simple 4 X 4 deep steel box could function as an ISBP module. Five such boxes for the common services indoors would take up a little more space than 20 X 4 inches (long and wide), or 80 square inches.
Maintain an isolated neutral when passing current through for outlets. Do not bond the neutral to ground in any ISBP indoors, and there should be no excuse to bond them in any outdoor ISBP. Such bonding would create excess current flow across the ISBP and endanger the user.
13 service modules X 4 inches apiece (using a 4 X 4 steel electrical box) = 52 inches in length. This is easy to remember when you consider that one deck of playing cards is composed of four suits of 13 cards each, totaling 52 cards.
Of course, a full-service, 13-module ISBP would be slightly longer than 52 inches, perhaps closer to 53 inches, due to the side-by-side construction and thickness of the sides in each module.
Multiple ISBPs may be preferred on the load side of the ESE where occupants reside and where only readily available services are represented at the room in contrast to the total services represented at the facility. Always connect the largest available size dedicated bonding jumper between ISBPs.
If there is ever a situation in which ISBPs exist outdoors and indoors at the same facility, or restated as on both supply and load sides of the ESE, then the two ISBPs must be bonded directly together as is always the case. Bonding interior and exterior ISBPs through the ESE would be ideal.
While only one ISBP is required at the exterior of a facility, the need becomes more critical indoors where occupants reside.
The benefit of multiple ISBPs on the load side of the ESE is that these ISBPs are located with the occupants indoors, and serve as the last line of defense against voltage fluctuations and current flow hurting the occupants and damaging equipment and increasing the risk of fire.
Multiple ISBPs are needed most in situations where the bonding jumpers within the suites are of small size.
Ideally, any two ISBPs at the same facility must be bonded directly together. This should be done as far as is practical across all the ISBPs. Any two ISBPs within two meters distance should definitely be bonded directly together or collapsed into one ISBP with all their sponsored modules. Among the advantages and benefits of bonding multiple ISBPs together are ensuring all systems are integrated into one star point, and the opportunity for lowering resistance and increasing ampacity at the ISBPs.
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