ESE Pulsar v Faraday Cage

As the increase in popularity of the ESE (Early Streamer Emission) Pulsar systems for providing lightning protection increases the UK lightning protection industry and building designers are increasingly faced with finally confronting the barriers traditionalists and stalwarts of the Faraday cage system often present when electing to reject ESE Pulsars.

For example English Heritage will not entertain the thought of an ESE Pulsar even though aesthetically the Pulsar can be installed discretely, represent a cost saving and indeed greatly reduce the effects associated with metal theft.

What are the reasons behind this reluctance to accept ESE Pulsars? First lets look at the authors and those who contribute to the writing of lightning protection standards here in the UK.

As with the writing of most standards it often falls upon those with product knowledge and industry experience to produce the content for a standard, often these individuals will still be in employment and therefore it could be argued have a vested interest in promoting a particular ethos, in this case the traditional proven faraday cage system.

It is a well known fact that the use of a correctly designed ESE Pulsar requires considerably less materials and can be installed in a fraction of the time compared to a Faraday cage installation therefore greatly reducing revenues.

Secondly a reluctance to promote ESE Pulsars has also centred around questions raised about the quality of some products, particularly from the far east with stories including nothing being found  inside a sealed Pulsar unit once opened up!! Concerns have also been raised in relation to the validity of testing undertaken to prove the performance of a Pulsar however with the recent acquisition of Helita by ABB all of the aforementioned has been put to bed.

ABB testing facility at Pic du Midi located at 2877m in the French Pyreenes provides state of the art testing and with each and every pulsar produced tested before being dispatched the ABB Helita Pulsar supported by the French national standard NF C 17-102. ChurchillSC Ltd have embraced the ESE Pulsar because like it or not the Pulsar is here to stay and offers a very viable cost effective solution for providing lightning protection