I have installed a meter 200 feet away from the building with the only disconnect being in the building at the point of entry. Inspector says I need a disconnect close to the meter. I think he is wrong

"I have installed a meter 200 feet away from the building"

200ft away from the building being served?

More information please, what did your utility say about this installation?

And when you applied for the permit, did you include a plan with the intended layout with your permit application?

230.70(A)(1) "The service disconnecting means shall be installed at a readily accessible location either outside of a building or structure or inside nearest the point of enterance of the service conductors."

If your meter is remote, then I believe you'll need the service disconnect remote also. You can pedestal equipment that will hold your meter and main disconnect in one unit.

Why does the meter have to be 200 feet away anyway? If you move it to the building you'd ba OK.

Plan reviews are not required in Michigan unless the Service is 400 amps or more....or the building is over 3500 sq feet.

The POCO would not run overhead or undeground through the woods.......so we trenched it in ourselves

[This message has been edited by velect (edited 09-06-2006).]

Since you own the lateral and not the POCO, it looks more and more like the AHJ has you.

I have put services in before that the meter was on one side of the house and we buried the conductors over to the other side of the house at the point of entry with only a disconnect on the main panel inside with no issues from the inspector. Granted it wasn't 200 feet but I see no difference

Yeah, I know what you mean. These guys change their minds like the weather sometimes. What you want seems safe enough, but they wear the badge.

A friend of mine recently did a similar installation. The house was several hundred feet away from the street. He installed a shunt trip breaker for the main. He installed a pushbutton at the street by the meter, so the main could be opened there, as well as being able to manually open it at the house.

I am not sure what the inspector is citing as a code reason for his ruling. Is there some local code? In fact the NEC would allow a single disconnect, either immediately where it enters the house, out there at the meter or anywhere in between. Perhaps a bad design but not illegal.
At a certain point you still have to work there so it may be easier to just ask what he wants.