Energy efficiency reduces energy costs, increases reliability and availability of electricity, improves building occupant comfort, and reduces impacts to the environment making standards important and necessary for California’s energy future.
Reducing energy use is a benefit to all. Homeowners save money, Californians have a more secure and healthy economy, the environment is less negatively impacted, and our electrical system can operate in a more stable manner. The 2013 Standards (for both residential and nonresidential buildings) are expected to reduce the growth in electricity use by 464 gigawatt-hours per year (GWh/yr) and reduce the growth in natural gas use by 10.9 million therms per year (therms/yr). The savings attributable to new low-rise residences are 23.6 GWh/yr of electricity savings and 1.1 million therms of natural gas. These savings are first year annual savings based on the estimated housing starts and existing dwelling renovation levels. The cumulative 3-year savings are much higher than these numbers.
Buildings are one of the major contributors to electricity demand. We learned during the 2000/2001 California electricity crisis and the east coast blackout in the summer of 2003 that our electric distribution network is fragile and system overloads caused by excessive demand from buildings can create unstable conditions. Furthermore, resulting blackouts can seriously disrupt business and cost the economy billions of dollars.
Since the California electricity crisis, the Energy Commission has placed more and more emphasis on demand reduction. The 2013 Standards are expected to reduce electric demand by 138.7 MW each year and 35 MW are attributable to low-rise residential buildings. Like energy savings, demand savings accumulate each year.
Comfort is an important benefit of energy efficient homes. Energy efficient houses are well insulated, less drafty, and use high performance windows and/or shading to reduce solar gains and heat loss. Poorly designed building envelopes result in houses that are less comfortable. Even with oversized heating and cooling systems, comfort cannot be achieved in older, poorly insulated and leaky homes.
For the homeowner, energy efficiency helps to ensure that a home is affordable both now and into the future. Banks and other financial institutions recognize the impact of energy efficiency through energy efficient mortgages; they look at the total cost of owning the home, including paying the utility bills. If the utility bills are lower, lenders can qualify borrowers for a larger loan.
From a larger perspective, the less California depends on depletable resources such as natural gas, coal, and oil, the stronger and more stable the economy will remain in the face of energy cost increases. A cost-effective investment in energy efficiency helps everyone. In many ways, it is far more cost effective for the people of California to invest in saving energy than it is to invest in building new power plants.
In many parts of the world, energy use has led to oil spills, acid rain, smog, and other forms of environmental pollution that have ruined the natural beauty people seek to enjoy. California is not immune to these problems, but appliance standards, building standards, and utility programs that promote efficiency and conservation help to maintain environmental quality. Other benefits include reduced destruction of natural habitats, which helps protect animals, plants, and natural systems.
Burning fossil fuels contributes greatly to global warming; carbon dioxide is being added to an atmosphere already containing 35 percent more than it did two centuries ago. Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases create an insulating layer around the earth that leads to global climate change. Energy Commission research shows that most of the sectors of the state economy face significant risk from climate change, including water resources (from reduced snow pack), agriculture, forests, and the natural habitats of a number of indigenous plants and animals.
Scientists recommend that actions be taken to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. While adding scrubbers to power plants and catalytic converters to cars reduce other emissions, they do not limit the carbon dioxide we emit into the atmosphere. Using energy efficiently is a far-reaching strategy that can make an important contribution to the reduction of greenhouse gases.
The National Academy of Sciences has urged the whole country to follow California's lead on such efforts, saying that conservation and efficiency should be the chief element in energy and global warming policy. Their first efficiency recommendation was simple: Adopt nationwide energy efficient building codes. Energy conservation will not only increase comfort levels and save homeowners money, it will also play a vital role in creating and maintaining a healthy environment.
The Standards are expected to have a significant impact on reducing greenhouse gas and other air emissions. Carbon dioxide, one of the more prevalent greenhouse gases, would be reduced by 16,110 metric tons the first year when the Standards go into effect; the cumulative 3-year savings or the CO2 savings over the life of the Standards are much higher than the savings indicated above.. These estimates are based, when possible, on hourly emission rates for electricity use in southern and northern California. When savings estimates are made on an annual basis, average emission rates are used.
Section 25402 of the Public Resources Code
The authority of the Energy Commission to develop and maintain building energy efficiency standards for new buildings is provided in Section 25402 of the Public Resources Code (the Code). This section of the Code, commonly referred to as the Warren-Alquist Act (the Act), is direction from the legislature on the development of building energy efficiency standards in California.
The Act created the Energy Commission in 1974 and gave it authority to develop and maintain building energy efficiency standards for new buildings. The Act directs the Energy Commission to “Prescribe, by regulation, lighting, insulation, climate control system, and other building design and construction standards which increase the efficiency in the use of energy for new residential and new nonresidential buildings.”
The Act also requires that the Standards be cost effective “when taken in their entirety and amortized over the economic life of the structure,” and it requires that the Energy Commission periodically update the Standards and develop manuals to support the Standards. The Act directs local building permit jurisdictions to withhold permits until the building satisfies the Standards.
The Public Resources Code was amended through Senate Bill 5X in 2002 to expand the authority of the Energy Commission to develop and maintain standards for outdoor lighting and signs.