Practical Standards from National Balancing Council

There is a lot that can be said about standards set up by various groups and organizations for the HVAC industry.  We will leave any controversy of standards to the news publications.  National Balancing Council has established what we often refer to as PRACTICAL STANDARDS.

What does “practical standards" mean?  Quite often the rules and guides that are created have been developed in a scientific and clean labratory environment.  These results are easy (for standard setting groups) to measure however challenges arise when a contractor tries to meet these standards out in the field. 

As we all know situations are as varied in the field as snowflakes (no two situations ever match).  Therefore it can often be unrealistic to meet standards that are established in a perfect environment in an imperfect world.

National Balancing Council’s practical standards are key guidelines established through a combination of lab settings and real world testing.  The results are true standards that good contractors use to generate accurate, repeatable, verifiable results.

Accurate standards not only help contractors with their work, but also help the customer recognize the true potential of their commercial comfort system.  Another point about practical standards vs. lab standards is that once a lab standard is set, it’s usually set in stone until there is an uprising from the industry.  Practical standards are meant to change as the industry changes and some current standards are a decade behind where they should be.  The world doesn’t sit still for a minute and National Balancing Council expects that standards should change as conditions change.

NBC Balancing specifications are available for review through the following downloads: NBC Certified Air Balancing Specifications and  NBC Certified Hydronic Balancing Specifications. Each specification can be customized to suit each individual balancing project. NBC will be there to support you with technical support for balancers, designers and specifiers.