Residential Whole Building Surge Protection in Altadena

Altadena’s foothill location against the San Gabriel Mountains creates significantly elevated lightning exposure—typically 4–6× higher than coastal or valley neighborhoods. Summer monsoon storms and winter weather systems generate frequent lightning that strikes elevated properties and induces voltage spikes through utility lines serving the entire area. Even homes that aren’t directly struck are vulnerable to surges from nearby events traveling through power, phone, and cable lines. Properly rated SPDs with excellent grounding provide essential protection that inland properties may not require to the same degree.

Fire-rebuilt homes feature brand-new electrical infrastructure loaded with modern, surge-sensitive electronics: comprehensive LED lighting with electronic drivers, smart thermostats and automation hubs, advanced HVAC controls, security networks, home theater systems, and often solar-plus-storage. These sophisticated systems are highly vulnerable to surge damage. While your new panel and wiring meet code, whole-building SPDs provide an additional, cost-effective protection layer that code doesn’t require but that safeguards your investment in electronics and provides protection well below the cost of replacing damaged equipment.

Yes. We design coordinated protection strategies for homes with solar PV and battery storage. This typically includes Type 2 SPDs at the main service, additional protection at the solar inverter’s AC output, and sometimes DC SPDs on the PV array side when indicated. Proper coordination protects your battery and inverter investments and charge controllers from both utility-side surges and PV-generated transients. We integrate with your existing SCE interconnection permit and ensure all protection devices meet utility requirements.

Foothill properties often have rocky, dry soil with poor electrical conductivity that compromises grounding effectiveness. We address this by installing multiple ground rods (often 3–4 instead of the code minimum), using deep-driven rods to reach better soil, sometimes treating soil with conductive enhancement compounds, and verifying performance with ground resistance testing. Enhanced grounding is critical for SPD effectiveness in high-lightning environments—we don’t consider an installation complete until we’ve measured and documented ground resistance meeting our performance standards, which are often stricter than code minimums.