Leveraging Your NSF Certification: Now that you've received NSF Certification ... why not leverage the Mark to your advantage.
Third party listing of reclaimed water piping systems provides engineers, regulators, and users the assurance that products are independently certified to meet requirements for reclaimed water end use. Third party certification reduces potential liability, increases confidence and product acceptance, and helps to ensure product consistency in meeting all applicable requirements.
The reclaimed water pipes are produced in "purple" color and marked with "NSF-rw" for easy identification for this end use application.
NSF/ANSI Standard 14 is the American national standard for plastic piping system components and related materials and provides a major benefit by establishing the minimum physical, performance, and health effects requirements for the plastic piping components. NSF/ANSI 14 establishes product testing, long-term strength, and quality control requirements that are key to ensuring product performance in the field.
NSF's certification program is designed to combine all the critical aspects of reclaimed water piping. Outlined below are NSF testing requirements:
Reclaimed water plastic pipe requirements:
NSF certification requires initial and ongoing facility inspections to ensure continued product compliance with applicable requirements. NSF's policies require certified reclaimed pipe facilities receive three unannounced inspections annually the scope of which includes:
Standard 14 requires manufacturers to perform critical quality control testing at the products facility at specified frequencies. In addition to quality control requirements established by the product design standards, the following is an example of requirements for PVC pipe:
| Test | Minimum Frequency |
|---|---|
| Impact | 24 hours |
| Dimensions, inner diameter or outer diameter | 2 hours |
| Dimensions, wall thickness | 2 hours |
| Sustained pressure | Annually |
| Flattening Resistance | Annually |
During the facility inspections, samples of certified products are collected by NSF from production or inventory for annual monitoring testing to all applicable requirements. NSF provides a detailed report that summarized the results of the product testing. Monitoring testing, combined with unannounced facility inspections, and required quality control testing document continued product compliance.
For more information on NSF Certification of reclaimed water pipe, contact sustainabilitysales@nsf.org.
