Ask The Atlanta Home Inspector

The Temperature Pressure Relief Valve (T&P) is a safety device on the hot water heater.  It’s job is to open up and discharge water from the hot water tank if the water heater builds up excessive pressure inside.  The T&P valve is what prevents the water heater from exploding from an excessive pressure build up.

The T&P needs to have an extension on it so that if water needs to be removed from the tank the water can terminate on the exterior of the home.  And the extension needs to terminate no more than 4 to 6 inches off of the soil so that if hot water was discharging out of the extension you wouldn’t get scalded.  

Well here’s an example of a “scalding situation” we came up on recently.