By Jocelyn Sarrantonio, PE | Technical Director at MeyerFire

In my previous role at a design consulting firm, I managed a team of 10-15 engineers who all worked on mission-critical facilities (hi, y’all!) One day, I overheard a project manager arguing with someone on my team about the way things were “supposed to be.” I think their specific argument was about how or when drawings were getting uploaded to a folder, but it just as easily could have been about a long list of items like titleblocks, who uploaded what deliverables, sharing Revit models, specifications: you name it.

If you’ve ever been a design consultant or really been a part of any deliverable, you know there’s a whole host of items that are due and set to be completed in a particular way, all at the last minute. In theory, these things should be simple, handled with checklists, calendar invites, reminders, emails, and Teams messages. But in the rush to complete a project, they always cause chaos. And really, they shouldn’t be that hard, but they always become such a time suck on deliverable day. I’m sure we’ve all been a part of, probably on both sides, of conversations like that.

​A perfect example of this is with titleblocks. 

If you learned drafting in the AutoCAD days, title blocks were so easy: double-click, change text, and you’re done. In Revit…not so simple. The process is more complicated, because Revit is a more powerful tool. But that also means it requires communication and coordination, and it can be frustrating.

Regardless of the CAD program, there always seems to be last minute decisions or miscommunications.

Are we putting dots or slashes in the date?

What is the submission called? Issue for Construction? No, Issued for Construction.

Stamps or no stamps?

What should the filename be called?

What’s the correct titleblock?

Oh, it should be V2_final, not V3.

​​I started telling people, because I was of course so wise (sarcasm), that the chaos was part of the job. It did allow me to reach kind of a zen state in my own work, to not save too much actual design work for the last minute, because there are always these chaotic requests or last-minute changes, and the reason they get missed is because engineers are still designing up until the very last minute. Sorry to reveal what’s behind the curtain, but it’s true! [Editor's Note: It happens everywhere, too!]

And because I’m a millennial, I even had a go-to meme that helped me not get so frustrated during the chaotic last-minute deliverable days. 

For design consultants, it’s title blocks, but I’m sure for every other sector there’s a similar atrociously inefficient process that we all just kind of accept because….well either because it seems like a problem that’s too big to fix or feels like Mount Everest.

But basically, by telling people that the chaos was part of it, I was telling people to accept the crummy parts of their job, parts of the job that were really just paperwork, they weren’t even engineering. We all just accept some level of chaos or friction as a normal part of the job. And I was even counseling my team to just suck it up because we lowly fire protection engineers were not about to reinvent the wheel. That’s middle management for ya!

Only now that I’ve stepped away from the day-to-day grind of drawing delivery do I realize that is so not true. It doesn’t have to be this way.

Surprise! This blog post isn’t even about titleblocks. It’s about AI.

PIVOT TO AI
I was a slow adopter of AI, I really only started using it after starting this job.

I’d been a skeptic, thinking of myself as a purist. But AI is here, and it’s another tool in our belt. Like any tool, you can learn how to use it and reap the benefits, or you can ignore it and miss out.

At first I was a little insecure because I thought using AI would remove the expertise that I was supposed to be providing. But just like the example of the titleblocks, there’s a fair amount to any job that’s just drudgery and unrelated to the job at all. And AI is really good at doing the drudgery, the keeping track of things, weeding through lots of information.

It’s also fast, great at proofreading, letting you know if you’ve missed something, and continuing to learn and improve.

It should be obvious, though I will say it, AI is not the replacement for good and responsible engineering. Think of it like a conversation with your (smart) colleague. Even if they give you great advice, you are still responsible for your own work.

But also, just like your colleague, AI might be wrong! ChatGPT has been known to hallucinate or complete change its mind when challenged.

RETHINKING THE CHAOS
What if we thought a little bit differently, and instead of accepting our fates of chaos on submission day, what if there was something that could be done to improve our processes?

If you work with a team that’s open to new things, there might be some room for AI to take a bit of the drudgery out of our processes. Let it do some of the tedious processes, the research, transcriptions, poring through files to find answers, so that you can actually do the engineering and the creative stuff.

What are the most stressful or monotonous parts of your job or processes that could use an AI assistant?

Maybe it’s getting a summary of the 13 back-and-forth emails about what should be in the title block, so you don’t have to dig through each one to get your answer.

Or maybe you’re designing a high-rise or a parking garage for the first time, and you use it as an assistant to help perform code research, to make sure you’ve captured all of the requirements.

You could feed a meeting transcript from a page turn into AI and get your to-do list in bullet points.

If you write a lot of technical documents and emails, AI is a thorough and fast proofreader, that doesn’t get put to sleep by the content. And it’ll probably give you suggestions for things you could include to better make your point. If you can do all that, the quality of your work is improved, and the outcome is better. 

Those examples are just the tip of the iceberg. I’m sure if you thought about it with your team, your peers, and your company’s management, there’s room for process improvements all over. You just have to start looking and find some folks willing to challenge the chaos. And right now, I would advise the people on my team that instead of accepting that the chaos is part of the job, to see if they can find some opportunity for change. We may not be able to change processes for people at other companies or things that are outside of our control, but maybe we can improve our parts of them. 
​
BOTTOM LINE
AI is already being used by your peers, competitors, and likely your new hires. The more you understand about how the tool can be used, the better it will be for you. As engineers we are ultimately responsible for our work output, so that both imparts some responsibility on us to be the decision makers, but also should provide some level of comfort that at the end of the day, that we are still responsible for public safety in the built environment.  

With the introduction of any new tool, the industry has to shape-shift to accommodate it. We don’t really do hand drafting or calculations on paper forms anymore, so we value skills in CAD and the ability to use hydraulic calculation programs. In a similar way, the introduction of AI is pushing the need for different skills. In the coming weeks Joe will share some trends we're seeing with AI pushing the need for different skillsets - that while our professional obligation and responsibility is still the same - we're already seeing a need for different skills than we had before. 

Thanks for reading and always remember to keep learning, keep improving, and you don't always have to accept the chaos. And if you like Patrick memes, come follow us on Instagram!

By Joe Meyer, PE | Fire Protection Engineer / Founder of MeyerFire 

One of the traditionally-tricky nuances of standpipe design was when we had standpipes within exit stairs - does the standpipe hose connection go on the floor-level stair landing, or the intermediate-level stair landing?

Since the IBC was first developed, there have been mixed results, depending on the year, as to whether the IBC and NFPA 14 suggested the same location.

​Today I'm updating a previous dive on the topic with the latest NFPA 14 and IBC alignment taken into account.

STANDPIPE READS
If you haven't read already, here are a few good reads on standpipes we have:

   An Introduction to Standpipes
   Addressing Egress & Clearances for Standpipe Hose Connections
​   Standpipes: Floor vs. Intermediate-Level Landings (← The key read for this topic)

CHEATSHEET
​Here is a printable cheatsheet for standpipe hose connections and stairway landing locations - correlating the different editions of the IBC (2000-2024) and NFPA 14 (1996-2024).

If you find these helpful, you have to join MeyerFire University. This is just one of over a hundred printable PDF resources we have on the site alongside our online courses and virtual simulations. You get access to all of them within 2 minutes of signing up:

What's notable for the 2024 IBC and 2024 NFPA 14, is that they now correlate well.

LATEST CHANGES
For a period of time, the default location for standpipe hose connections different between the two (Intermediate-Floor Level for IBC 2012 and 2015, and Main Floor Landing for NFPA 14 2010 and 2013).

That's no longer the case in both the IBC and NFPA 14 now defaulting to the Main Floor Landing unless approved otherwise by the AHJ. That part hasn't changed.

What has been clarified is that standpipe hose connections are required for all required interior and exterior exit stairs. The IBC and NFPA 14 didn't explicitly include exterior exit stairways, though it would have been reasonable to include standpipe hose connections for required exterior exit stairs because of the verbiage in NFPA 14 of "Exit Stairways" in Sections 7.3.2 and 7.3.2.1 of the 2010-2019 editions. 

Today, in the latest available editions at the time of this writing, IBC 905.4 and NFPA 14-2024 Section 9.5.2.1 directs us to standpipe hose connections in "required interior and exterior exit stairs," which clarifies and puts the matter to rest.

WANT MORE?
If you enjoyed this topic, don't forget to check out the greater breakout article in Standpipes: Floor vs. Intermediate-Level Landings. And if you enjoy the resources, consider joining MeyerFire University. It's exploding in learner growth (amount of NICET and ICC continuing education credit hours), in the amount of organizations (now over 550 companies and organizations), and in new content (42 new courses added since 2023). Great time to join.

Thanks for reading and being part of our community! Have a great rest of your week.

- Joe

By Jocelyn Sarrantonio, PE | Technical Director at MeyerFire

These are exciting times in ESS Safety Land! The much-anticipated 2026 edition of NFPA 855: Standard for the Installation of Stationary Energy Storage Systems was made available last Thursday, ahead of schedule. You can read the new edition on NFPA Link now.

NFPA 855 RELEVANCE
If you don’t know what NFPA 855 is, it’s the ESS standard, first published in 2020, which is now on its third edition. The codes have been changing rapidly to keep up with the fire and explosion hazards of ESS, and although not outright adopted in most jurisdictions, NFPA 855 sets the standard for protection of ESS.

Because NFPA makes the drafts, proceedings of the Technical Committee, and the results of voting in the Conference Technical Session available to the public, we’ve had some previews about what the new code would include. The changes I was looking forward to learning about were those that would impact project designs and the level of involvement that fire protection engineers should have in project documentation, such as hazard mitigation analyses and emergency response plans.

​Having attended a lot of presentations on ESS in the past few years, the chatter was becoming quite loud that the current testing protocols were not going far enough, so it’s not surprising that new requirements were added there. I was also tuned into any changes in suppression requirements, having read through the motions that were to be voted on during this year’s Technical Session.

I’m sure the full industry impact will develop as time goes on, but now that it’s in writing, let’s take a first pass at some of the new provisions that will impact the ESS landscape. 

NEW BATTERY TECHNOLOGIES
First, NFPA 855 has been expanding the battery technologies that are specifically covered. This is important because there is a catchall entry for “All other battery technologies”, which can be conservative. So both the Threshold Quantities table in Chapter 1 and the Electrochemical ESS Technology-Specific Table in Chapter 9 have been updated with these new technologies.

FIRE AND EXPLOSION TESTING
First, the new 2026 edition of NFPA 855 has stricter fire and explosion testing protocols. Note that NFPA 855 refers to testing as “fire and explosion testing protocols” instead of just the “large-scale fire test” terminology that the IFC uses.

The requirements are relocated from Section 9.1.5 to Section 9.2, and titled “Fire and Explosion Testing.”
In 2023, the requirement stated:

“Where required elsewhere in this standard, fire and explosion testing in accordance with 9.1.5 shall be conducted on a representative ESS in accordance with UL 9540A or equivalent test standard.”

The 2026 requirement states:

“Where required elsewhere in this standard, fire testing in accordance with Section 9.2 shall be conducted on a representative ESS in accordance with UL 9540A and large-scale fire testing to collect data for gas production at a cell level, thermal runaway propagation potential at a module level, and thermal runaway propagation potential between ESSs.”

What has not changed is that not all ESS require fire and explosion testing, only when required elsewhere in the code, when we want to deviate from prescriptive requirements. Previously, these testing requirements really just pointed us to UL9540A, but now in 2026, the reference is to UL9540A and large-scale fire testing.

What’s that about?

UL9540A is the Test Method for Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS), which is a protocol for testing ESS, initiates thermal runaway at the cell, module, unit, and installation levels of an ESS product, and collects the resulting data to help evaluate the fire and explosion hazards. However, as currently written, if a product passes at a given level, the test concludes and does not have to proceed to the next level. The argument against stopping the test is that the data collected may not present a realistic fire scenario, and therefore cannot truly be considered “large-scale”.

For example, if an external factor causes an incident, one that is not considered as part of the testing, then there is no data on how the ESS will perform in that scenario. Testing on ESS that does not proceed beyond the unit level does not provide any performance data in a larger failure scenario. The new wording in the 2026 edition requires the ESS to be tested per UL9540A and large-scale testing.

Annex G has been expanded, and Section G.11 is “Guidance on Implementing a Large-Scale Fire Test (LSFT)”. No other test standard besides UL9540A is noted here, but expect that document to be revised to catch up with revisions in NFPA 855.

Another addition to this section includes a requirement for ignition of vented gases in Section 9.2.1.2:

Where cell thermal runaway results in the release of flammable gases during a cell- or module-level test, an additional unit-level test shall be conducted involving intentional ignition of the vent gases to assess the fire propagation hazard.

Understanding what level of testing is expected by your jurisdiction will be a critical step in the ESS installation under NFPA 855-2026.

HAZARD MITIGATION ANALYSIS
Prior to 2026, there were several triggers requiring a Hazard Mitigation Analysis (HMA) in NFPA 855, most notably as a mechanism to exceed the maximum stored energy limits in Chapter 9. These HMA triggers were located in Chapter 4, which are general requirements meant to apply to all situations. Now, Section 4.4.1 has been re-written more broadly to require an HMA by default, unless otherwise modified in the subsequent technology-specific chapters.

What is the impact?

Previously, if you had a situation where you exceeded the Threshold Quantities for a given battery technology in Chapter 1, but were below the Maximum Stored Energy Limits, no HMA was required. Now that is not true, and essentially all installations require an HMA, except as modified by the technology-specific chapters. Because there is no longer a benefit of staying below the Maximum Stored Energy limits, the table is removed in the 2026 edition.

Although located in the Annex, the new edition also includes a recommendation that the HMA and fire risk assessment should be directed by a registered design professional. Put that PE license to work!

FIRE SUPPRESSION REQUIREMENTS
The changes made in Section 4.9 for Fire Control and Suppression are a little murkier. We are used to seeing a requirement for sprinklers as the default option, and alternate fire-extinguishing options may be permitted where they are supported by testing results. And to me, that’s how the 2023 edition read; sprinklers were the default option, and any other system type must have fire and explosion testing to support the design. There was a list of standards included for the following alternative system types: carbon dioxide (NFPA 12), water spray (NFPA 15), water mist (NFPA 750), hybrid water and inert gas (NFPA 770), clean agent (NFPA 2001), and aerosol (NFPA 2010).

Now in 2026, some of the words were changed and removed. The word “alternate” is struck, and NFPA 13 is included in the list of Fire Control and Suppression Systems, essentially putting all the system types on equal footing. And the requirement to permit “other systems”, where supported by large-scale fire and explosion testing, was moved after the list of acceptable NFPA standards.

To my reading, in 2023, the “other systems” were the alternative systems, but now, with the relocation of the requirement, the implication is that the use of those systems is not an alternative, and they are free to be used, without the use of large-scale fire and explosion testing to support their design. That was surprising to me, but I’d love to hear if that is consistent with the committee’s intent. I know it was the subject of a floor vote at June’s NFPA Technical Meeting, so I’d love to be enlightened if I am misinterpreting the changes.

EMERGENCY RESPONSE PLANNING AND TRAINING
NFPA 855 previous editions included Emergency Response Plan requirements in Section 4.3, but they’ve been revised in 2026 to require the plan to be developed with the AHJ and be submitted prior to training of required personnel.

The reason I am highlighting this change is that I know a lot of times items like these can become a last-minute hot potato without a clear directive for who is responsible. But if you’re reading this far, you probably know a lot about ESS, so maybe it should be you! Sometimes it just takes a competent individual to work with stakeholders to develop a plan that satisfies local fire department requirements. 

As we dig further into the new NFPA 855, I’m sure we will uncover more changes that impact the ESS landscape. Annex G, for example, has been really developed to include a lot of helpful material. If you’re interested in this content, we have an upcoming course on MeyerFire University that will cover code provisions for ESS. See you there!