They are saying if visqueen is present on a footer, it only goes up the sides, the bottom of the concrete is directly in the dirt. Typically there is none anyway. On a momoslab, the visqueen stops at the footer portion of the pour.. They only form the perimeter and they leave the forms up for a week or two so the concrete does not dry out before in is mostly cured, then they back fill pretty much right away. I think the Ufer became so important here because it is really the best electrode available and the building officials are really serious about making sure it is available. Rods are really pretty useless unless you can drive to ground water. This got to be a real issue at the trade groups around here about 15 years ago and there was a sort of Ufermania. The feeling was it "shall be made available" instead of just being used if it "is" available.The cost ends up being less than 2 rods and the hardware so the builders were happy. The compression of building departments after the crash of 08-9 left a whole lot of multi discipline inspectors so the structural guy doing the footer inspection also carries an electrical certification. Guys were usually retained based on how many licenses they held. I have been getting away from all of this so I am not sure how it is going now that they are staffing up again. Hopefully they are teaching the structural guys the principles of the Ufer electrode and they are still being as diligent about being sure it is present when sparky comes along.
