Brentwood, CA · January – February 2023 · LADWP / LADBS

Brentwood: the correction was a water bond sixty feet away.

Thirty-three modules went up in a day. The item that held the permit open was a single conductor on the ground.

Written by the Cali Energy project team · California contractor license 1032379 · Updated September 2026

A solar final inspection in Los Angeles covers the grounding electrode system as well as the array, and on older houses the bond between the service equipment and the metal underground water pipe is a common place to fail. On this Brentwood project the water pipe was about sixty feet from the panel, which turned a small code item into a real conductor run. Cali Energy installed the bond on the morning of the re-inspection and the 12.87 kW system in Brentwood, Los Angeles, was released the same day.

At a glance

System

12.87 kW

Array

33 modules, 390 W each

Inverters

One microinverter per module

Failed on

Grounding bond to the main water pipe

Distance to the water pipe

About sixty feet from the panel

Utility / AHJ

LADWP / LADBS

The story

Thirty-three modules, one microinverter behind each of them, twelve and a half kilowatts and change on a large Westside roof. Requested on the twenty-fourth of January, installed on the third of February. That part was uneventful.

The final inspection was on the fourteenth. It did not pass, and the reason was not on the roof.

The item was the grounding electrode system — specifically the bond between the service equipment and the metal underground water pipe. This is one of the oldest requirements in the electrical code and it has nothing to do with solar as such. What solar does is bring an inspector to a house that may not have been looked at in decades, with a checklist that includes it.

On a compact house that is a short run and a small piece of work. Here the main water pipe was about sixty feet from the service panel. Same code item, entirely different job: a long conductor run, a route to plan, and a cost that has to be agreed before anybody picks up a shovel.

Which is the practical warning for anyone with a big lot. Two houses can fail the same inspection on the same line of the code and be looking at very different work, and the difference is measured in feet between the panel and the water main. It is worth asking about early, because it is the kind of item nobody thinks to check while the array is being designed.

The correction itself arrived in a way that surprises people who have done construction before. The inspector did not write it on the job card. He said corrections are issued online now, and the document came through by email the following day.

The same is true at the other end. When the project passed, there was no signature on a card either — the inspector finaled the permit online and released it to the utility from his side. A request for a signed job card at that point cannot be answered, because the object being asked for no longer exists on that project. The proof is the record in the department's own system.

The bond was installed on the morning of the twenty-third and the re-inspection was scheduled for the same day, which is the right way to handle a correction of this kind: do not book the inspector for a week later and do the work the night before. It passed, and the permit was released to the utility that afternoon.

One more thing happened the next day, and it belongs in the record. The owner reported that the garage door had stopped working and that he could not get in to charge his car. A garage somebody cannot open is not something to schedule for next week. A technician went out that morning, before the window we had promised, and it was fixed the same day.

The system was commissioned in March.

Cali Energy designed, installed and finaled this 12.87 kW array in Brentwood, Los Angeles.

How it ran

Twenty days from installation to a released permit, nineteen of which turned on a conductor between the panel and the water main.

What we did

• Installed thirty-three modules and their microinverters in a day.
• Read the correction properly rather than guessing at what the inspector wanted.
• Agreed the grounding scope before starting the work.
• Installed the bond on the morning of the re-inspection so nothing waited on it.
• Returned for a garage door callback the same morning it was reported.

System specifications

Is your project like this one?

• Your solar final failed on something that is not the array.
• An inspector has asked for a bond to the water pipe.
• You have a large lot and the water main is nowhere near the panel.
• Somebody has asked you for a signed job card and nobody has one.

Cali Energy in Brentwood

Frequently asked questions

Why did a solar inspection fail over a water pipe?

Because the final covers the grounding electrode system, not only the array. The bond between the service equipment and the metal underground water pipe is a long-standing electrical code requirement, and solar brings an inspector to houses that may not have been examined in decades. The array can be faultless and the project still fails on that line.

Does the distance to the water main matter?

A great deal. The same code item is a short run on a compact lot and a sixty-foot conductor run on a large one, with a route to plan and a cost to agree first. Two houses can fail on the same line and face very different work, so on a big lot it is worth asking about while the system is still being designed.

Do Los Angeles inspectors still sign a paper job card?

Not reliably. On this Brentwood project the correction was issued online and emailed rather than written on the card, and when the project passed the inspector finaled the permit in the department's system and released it to the utility from there. A request for a signed card cannot be met, because the record of the final lives online.

How do I prove my solar permit was finaled?

By the record in the building department's own system rather than by a signature on paper. That record is what the utility receives when the permit is released, and it is what a future buyer's inspector or a title company will look at. If somebody asks you for a signed card and there is not one, that is the answer to give them.

Does Cali Energy install larger systems in Brentwood, Los Angeles?

Yes. This Brentwood project was 12.87 kW across thirty-three modules with a microinverter on each. Larger Westside houses bring their own constraints — long runs between the service equipment and everything it has to reach, and grounding items that are trivial elsewhere and substantial here.

What this would look like on your roof

Related

• The inspector sent it back to plan check Hollywood Hills, Los Angeles · garage sub panel · unfused conductors Solar
• One house, one crew, three permits — and the last one held the switch Glendale, CA · 20.8 kW · tile off, shingle on, panel rebuilt, three finals Solar
• What an installer certifies El Sereno, Los Angeles · 4.44 kW · the line around somebody else's wiring Solar
• The city permit was not the permission that mattered Mid-City, Los Angeles · two jurisdictions · nine weeks on a finished array Solar
• The file a finished job leaves Beverlywood, Los Angeles · what to ask for when the array is done Solar

This timeline reflects this property and this permitting path. Updated September 2026.