Originally Posted By: jpope This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
The local utility company may allow copper and/or brass piping for use as natural gas supply depending on the percentage of hydrogen sulfide in the fuel.
Originally Posted By: Lee Hammerstein This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
Copper is acceptable with natural gas. Usually black pipe is used from the meter to inside the building.
I was doing hvac work in northern Wisconsin in the early 1990s and it was forbidden by Wisconsin Public Service to use any copper for natural gas at that time.
Then WPS started expanding to rural areas where LP gas was common and usually had copper piping throughout the house.
The cost of converting these houses to black pipe would be too much for most homeowners to justify the switch to natural gas.
Amazingly it was somehow perfectly alright to use copper as long as black pipe was used to enter the building. The pipe also had to be protected with a vapor barrier (electrical tape or plastic tube) where it entered the building, and grounded.
What is allowed is up to the local utility company and has more to do with their own economics than anything else.
Originally Posted By: rhinck This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
Be sure to check w/ the local inspection dept. In my area copper w/ sweat connections are not allowed in new construction- only if the connections are brazed/ not soldered. I run into many copper gaslines w/ soldered connections and you have to write them up as a safety issue, even though they have been “grandfathered” in when it comes to code. I remind the buyer that being “grandfathered” does not instantly make them “safe”! If they think about it a soldered connection will melt at around 600 degrees and come apart allowing nat. gas to become a blow torch. It doesn’t take much of a fire to produce 600 degrees.
Originally Posted By: Kyle Kubs This post was automatically imported from our archived forum.
In most areas copper tubing (soft, thick walled, comes in long coils) is allowed, as Jeff said so long as the gas supplier approves. It also must be clearly marked as “Gas Line” so it can not be mistaken for a water line and cut into by accident. At least in my area copper pipe is never allowed.
– Those that say it cannot be done should stop interupting those of us who are hard at work, doing it…