Specifier guide

HVHZ, Product Approval and Exterior Lighting

Whether light poles and exterior fixtures need Florida Product Approval or a Miami-Dade NOA, and what governs them instead.

Need your fixture schedule priced, or just need to know if I represent the line? Send me the project or ask me a question. No charge for a takeoff.

Get it priced 786-395-1222

This page exists because the question gets asked on almost every Broward and Miami-Dade site lighting job, usually in a hurry, usually after a plan reviewer has written a comment: does this light pole or this exterior fixture need a Florida Product Approval or a Miami-Dade Notice of Acceptance?

It is a fair question, because in the High Velocity Hurricane Zone a great many things do. It is also a question almost nobody has written a clear answer to, so people guess, and the guess is usually expensive in one direction or the other.

What the HVHZ is

The High Velocity Hurricane Zone is a set of enhanced provisions in the Florida Building Code that applies to Broward County and Miami-Dade County. Not Palm Beach, not Monroe. The definition sits in the Florida Building Code, Part II, Chapter 2, Section 202, and the wind load provisions for the zone are in Chapter 16.

The HVHZ is also where the TAS test protocols live: TAS 201 for large missile impact, TAS 202 for uniform static air pressure, and TAS 203 for cyclic wind pressure. These are the enhanced product approval standards that Broward and Miami-Dade apply beyond the rest of the state, and they are the reason a window or a shutter sold in Fort Lauderdale carries paperwork that the same window does not need in Orlando.

The eight product categories, and what is not in them

Florida product approval is not a general requirement for everything installed on a building. It applies to a defined and closed list. Section 553.842 of the Florida Statutes directs the Commission to approve the following categories:

Panel walls. Exterior doors. Roofing. Skylights. Windows. Shutters. Impact protective systems. Structural components.

The same eight categories are carried in rule, and they apply to products forming the building envelope and structural frame. The logic of the whole scheme is protection of habitable space from flying debris and storm loads.

Exterior light fixtures and light poles are not building envelope and are not structural frame, and they do not appear in any of the eight categories. On that basis they generally do not require Florida Product Approval or a Miami-Dade Notice of Acceptance in their own right.

Read that carefully, because it is not a free pass. Not requiring product approval is not the same as not requiring engineering. What replaces product approval for a product outside the eight categories is a site-specific, signed and sealed evaluation by a licensed engineer demonstrating that the loads on the component are not exceeded where it is being used. For a light pole in a hurricane county, that is a real piece of work and it is where your effort should go.

What actually governs a light pole here

ASCE 7, through the Florida Building Code. The 2023 Florida Building Code, 8th Edition, references ASCE 7-22. Design wind speeds come from the code figures by risk category, or from the ASCE Wind Design Geodatabase.
Not AASHTO LTS, for ordinary site lighting. The Florida Building Commission has addressed this in a declaratory statement, the practical effect being that the exception permitting the AASHTO standard for structural supports for highway signs, luminaires and traffic signals is not a license to design a shopping center parking lot to a highway standard. A parking lot is not a state highway. I flag this because it is under-known and it does get caught in review, but the primary Commission document is the thing to put in front of a reviewer, not this page.
The ASCE edition your pole chart was written against. Manufacturers have published EPA tables against ASCE 7-93, 7-05, 7-10, 7-16 and 7-22. Those bases are not equivalent. A pole rated at 170 mph on a 1993 basis is not the same pole as one rated 170 mph under ASCE 7-22.
Effective Projected Area, totalled. Every luminaire, arm, bracket, camera, banner arm and sign on the pole contributes. The sum, and the total weight, must stay inside the pole manufacturer maximum at the design wind speed.
The numbers on the drawings. Florida Building Code section 1603.1.4 requires construction documents to state the ultimate design wind speed and the nominal design wind speed whether or not wind governs the design.

One tool warning worth more than the rest of this page

Do not use the ATC Hazard by Location website for a job under the 2023 code. Florida Building Commission material is explicit that it does not support the ASCE 7-22 edition the current code references. It will happily return a wind speed. That wind speed will be from an older edition, and a reviewer who checks will reject the submittal. Use the adopted Florida Building Code figures or the ASCE Wind Design Geodatabase.

So what should you actually do

Ask the building department for the specific site. They are the authority having jurisdiction and they decide what they will accept. Within Broward, the municipality is usually the local enforcement agency, so the answer can differ between two cities ten minutes apart.
If a reviewer has asked for something, send me the comment. I would far rather price to an actual plan review comment than to a general assumption about what might be required.
Get the manufacturer documentation early. Whatever the reviewer wants, pole EPA tables at the design wind speed, anchor bolt details, foundation reactions, certified drawings, the manufacturer publishes it and I can obtain it. Asking after the pole ships is the slow way.
Do not let the fixture and the pole be bought from different places. The EPA arithmetic and the bolt circle both have to work, and split purchasing is where mismatches come from.

These packages cover poles, arms, brackets and luminaires, and I will check the combined EPA and weight against the manufacturer tables for the wind speed you give me. I am not the engineer of record and I will not pretend to be. Send the schedule and any plan review comments through the quote form, or call 786-395-1222.

Common questions

Does a light pole need a Miami-Dade NOA?

Generally not in its own right. Florida product approval covers a closed list of eight categories tied to the building envelope and structural frame, and lighting is not among them. What is usually required instead is site-specific signed and sealed engineering showing the pole and everything on it works at the design wind speed. The building department for your site is the authority, so ask them, and tell me what they say.

Does an exterior wall-mounted luminaire need product approval?

On the same basis, generally not. A luminaire is not building envelope. If it is being mounted through an envelope assembly, the penetration and the assembly may well be a different matter, and that belongs to whoever is responsible for the envelope detail.

Which counties are in the HVHZ?

Broward and Miami-Dade only. Palm Beach and Monroe are not in the High Velocity Hurricane Zone, though they have their own wind requirements under the code.

What wind speed should I design a parking lot pole to?

The one the project engineer sets from the adopted code figures or the ASCE Wind Design Geodatabase for that specific site, under ASCE 7-22. Not a county-wide planning figure, and not a number from the ATC Hazard website, which does not support the current edition.

Can you provide the engineering?

No. I am a manufacturer's representative for the SESCO lines. I can obtain the manufacturer pole data, EPA tables, anchor bolt templates and foundation reactions, which is what your engineer will need, and I will check the EPA arithmetic against the published tables. The sealed analysis has to come from a licensed engineer.

Ask me about your fixture schedule

Not ready for a full quote? Ask the question. Whether the line holds a spec, what the lead time looks like, or what I would put up as an alternative. I usually come back the same business day.

Or call 786-395-1222, Monday to Friday, nine to five. If you have drawings or a fixture schedule to attach, use the quote form instead.