National Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Codes & Standards Cooridinating Committee Minutes - May 4, 2005
by Russell Hewett, NREL

MEETING DATE: May 4, 2005
TIME: 1:00 - 2:30 PM (MST)

1.0 PARTICIPANTS
The list of participants in the teleconference meeting is provided in Attachment A (208Kb PDF).


2.0 REVIEW OF ANTI-TRUST POLICY
USFCC Codes and Standards Working Group meetings begin with the reminder to review and follow the anti-trust guidelines at the following web sites:

www.usfcc.com/members/ANTITRUST_GUIDELINES_REV.pdf

and

www.usfcc.com/members/Memo_on_Antitrust_Guidelines.pdf


3.0 CORRECTIONS TO MINUTES OF MARCH/APRIL MEETING
The March/April meeting of the Committee was the National Codes & Standards Workshop for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells held in conjunction with NHA's 2005 16th Annual US Hydrogen Conference and Hydrogen Expo.

Karen Hall made corrections to the Minutes that were incorporated into the Minutes posted on the Hydrogen Safety Report website. The corrections related to the evolution of the National Committee - specifically, NHA's past, ongoing involvement with DOE's original Hydrogen Codes and Standards Coordinating Committee.

Harry Jones (UL) pointed out a miss-attribution of a standard relating to micro fuel cells in the report given on USFCC activities. The standard is an IEC, rather than an ISO standard.


4.0 OPPORTUNITY FOR DOE/HQ SUBPROGRAM MANAGER TO
REPORT ON WHAT'S GOING ON AT DOE/HQ
Pat Davis (DOE/HQ Technology Development Manager for Safety, Codes and Standards) reported that, with respect to the budget for the FY06 Program, nothing has changed since his last report. There has not yet been a House of Representatives or Senate markup of the proposed FY06 budget.


5.0 DISCUSSION REGARDING HOW THE TELECONFERENCE
MEETINGS SHOULD BE CONDUCTED AND THE AGENDA
FOR THE MEETINGS
The Coordinating Committee has evolved into an entity involving a large number of organizations with both common and parochial interests, with respect to codes and standards:

• Codes and standards development organizations
  
• Energy/hydrogen companies
  
• Fuel cell companies
  
• Automotive companies
  
• Companies involved in producing products for the infrastructure
  Federal agencies
  
• etc.

Consequently, it made sense to take some time to do a "self assessment" regarding how the monthly teleconference meetings should be conducted and the topics that should be on the agenda so that the meetings represent "value added" to all participants - even with the participants having different interests and concerns.

Before the participants began general discussion of the issue, Pat Davis (DOE/HQ Technology Development Manager for Safety, Codes and Standards) was given the opportunity to provide his take on things. Pat proposed that the monthly meetings serve as a forum for doing at least two things:

• Communicating with each other regarding what's going on in order to get issues on the table and identify priorities
  
  
• Facilitating coordination of codes and standards development activities so that this is done consistently, efficiently and with minimization of duplications of efforts.

There was much interesting and valuable discussion by the members of the Committee. The following items "came to the front" as topics to be addressed (directly or indirectly) in each meeting:

1. Schedule of upcoming national and international hydrogen and fuel cell-related codes, standards and regulations events (i.e., events for which there is time to influence codes and standards development)
   
   
2. Opportunity for CDOs and SDOs to talk about that they are doing and get feedback and input from meeting participants
   
   
3. Making participants aware of: (i) the codes and standards development cycles of CDOs and SDOs; and (ii) publicizing codes and standards documents that are in the "Comments" period (so that participants can make input)
   
   
4. Forum for participants involved in international standards and regulations development efforts to get a pulse on what's going on with respect to US codes and standards development to facilitate formulating US positions
   
   
5. Getting issues on the table as they relate to coordination of activities
   
   
6. Identifying high-priority needs.

Since there is a large number of CDOs and SDOs participating in the Coordinating Committee and the goal is to limit the meetings not to exceed 90 minutes, there was the suggestion that perhaps the CDOs and SDOs should make their reports on a once-a-quarter, rotating basis. Of course, if there were a critical issue that a CDO or SDO should bring to the attention of the Committee in an "off month" (e.g., a document under development), that organization would be on the agenda for the current month.

There were two action items:

1. Action item for Kelvin Hecht to put together a listing of the normal codes and standards development cycles for the various CDOs and SDOs
2. Action item for Russ Hewett to generate a "Generic Agenda" to be followed in conducting the monthly teleconference meetings.

The Generic Agenda (draft) is available here for Committee review (106Kb PDF).


6.0 DRAFT MISSION STATEMENT FOR THE COORDINATING
COMMITTEE

In the March/April Workshop, a task force was established to begin the process to formulate a Mission Statement for the Coordinating Committee. The Task Force consists of:

• Darren Meyers (ICC)
  
• Karen Hall (NHA)
  
• Robert Wichert (USFCC)
  
• Sondra Ullman (Plug Power and USFCC)
  
• Susan Townsend (General Electric and NHA)
  
• Russ Hewett (NREL/DOE)

The Task Force had teleconference meetings that resulted in two concepts for a draft Mission Statement. They are available below:

• Draft Mission Statement 1 (123Kb PDF)
• Draft Mission Statement 2 (81Kb PDF)

There was much discussion regarding the drafts and what a Mission Statement should articulate, given the nature of the Coordinating Committee's representing various interests.

The action item was for the participants to review and critique both drafts and provide their feedback to the Task Force by May 25th.

The plan is for the Task Force to use the feedback to construct a single draft Mission Statement and present it to the full Coordinating Committee at the June meeting.


7.0 UPCOMING MEETING "HYDROGEN AND FUEL CELL
REGULATIONS IN THE US AND JAPAN"
Robert Wichert informed the Committee of the upcoming " Industry - To - Industry Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Regulations in the US and in Japan" meeting and invited their participation.

It will be as follows:

• DATE: May 25th
  
• LOCATION: Arlington, VA
  
• SITE: Crystal Gateway Marriott Hotel
  - Salon H
  - 1700 Jefferson Davis Highway

The Conference will feature a Hydrogen Safety Symposium on Monday and Tuesday, June 6 - 7.

In addition, during the Conference, Carl will convene a meeting of NFPA's Hydrogen Consulting Group as follows:

• DATE: June 6 (Monday)
  
• TIME: 3:30 - 5:30 pm
  
• LOCATION: Mandalay Bay South Convention Center, Conference Room: Palm G

1. Update people on the NFPA Fire Protection Research Foundation hydrogen technology projects (Kathleen Almand, Executive Director of the Foundation will be directing this portion of the meeting)
   
   
2. Update people on NFPA hydrogen codes and standards activities, specifically the proposal to the NFPA Standards Council to consolidate all hydrogen safety requirements in a single document
   
   
3. Answer questions on the NFPA code development process
   
   
4. Have an open discussion of where NFPA needs to do additional work to provide safety requirements for hydrogen technologies

In addition, during the Conference (June 8 - 10), the proposed changes to the NFPA codes and standards will be brought to the membership for voting.


10.0 ICC CODE DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES
The next meeting of the ICC Ad Hoc Committee (AHC) for Hydrogen Gas (and possibly the last meeting of the Committee as it currently exits) will be as follows:

• DATES: June 1 - 2 (Wednesday and Thursday)
  
• LOCATION: International Code Council, Inc.
  Chicago District Office
  4051 W. Flossmoor Rd.
  Country Club Hills, IL 60478-5795

The thinking is that it is time that the technology developers, manufacturers and others having an interest in the development of a US hydrogen economy assume responsibility for participation in the ICC code development process after the conclusion of the September/October ICC 2005 Final Action Hearings.

The announcement regarding Meeting No. 10 is available here (173Kb PDF).


NEXT MEETING
The next meeting is scheduled to be a teleconference meeting at follows:

• DATE
  June 1st (First Wednesday)
  (This is also the date for the meeting of the ICC Ad Hoc Committee for Hydrogen Gas)
  
  
• TIME
  3:00 - 4:30 pm EST
  2:00 - 3:30 pm CST
  1:00 - 2:30 pm MST

1. Layout for the proposed new Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Safety Report that will replace the current Hydrogen Safety Report
   
2. Continued work on formulating a Mission Statement for the
   Coordinating Committee
   
3. Constructing a "Generic Agenda" for conducting meetings