I am upgrading my house to a 200 AMP.

This requires a new service drop and panel. The technician that came out and gave requirements says I need to run a ground wire that connects my natural gas line, to my water line, to a 8' ground spike and to the new panel.

He instructed me to have few as breaks as possible and to use #4 wire.

Ok, here is the question. I have un-shielded copper wire in #4 and want to know if there is any issue with me running this ground connection on the external of my home.

Or do I need to run it into the attic, and same question there is bare copper OK to run through an attic for grounding purposes. I have see in new home construction the bare copper done in this manner when used to ground the water to gas etc.

Thx.

Using bare #4 copper wire is fine, or insulated is OK also. You can run the wire on the outside of the house, I suppose you will staple to just under the bottom edge of the siding. If there is a location that the exposed wire will be subjected to physical damage, should install in a conduit to help protect the wire.

Once this wire leaves the Main Service Switch, there shall be no breaks in the wire, it must be continuous wire to the last connection, or spliced with an irreversible method,which, for your purpose , I will not get into here.

You can come out of the Main Switch and go to the ground rod alone, and here you can use #6 wire, only to the rod. Or you can use the #4.

Check local codes, the states I am familiar with all require two ground rods, no closer to each other than 6 feet.

Also, double check connecting to the gas line. Since it sounds as if the utility commpany tech is the one that told you, and I would tend to believe him. Again, the states I am familiar with , the gas utility do not allow grounds connected to their lines, but other states may.

Also, when I have a utility water meter , I always must "jump" the meter with the ground wire. They have found that when workers remove the meter from the line, there can be existing ground fault currents flowing in the water pipe, and these workers have been injured by the shock.

"Jumping" means to connect the ground wire on both sides of the water meter, always keeping the wire continuous.


If you can't do continuous, you can go to each line with one ground wire each, but this uses up ports at the neutral lug.
By the way, I mention Main Switch because wherever that is , that is where you will find the neutral connection that the ground wire must start from, and cannot connect to a neutral no other location.

The home is in Arizona.

You are probably right about needing the second ground rod, he was unsure do to municipality on if I needed one or two, which I have not got a response from them yet.

The data sheet he presented me states "#4 Solid Copper w/Bonding clamps required from natural gas line and water line."

I verified that bit in the personal interview with him, knowing the hassle it will take me to run that ground wire around my home.

Thx you for your time.