The 2016 Standards focus on several key areas to improve the energy efficiency of newly constructed buildings and additions and alterations to existing buildings, and include requirements that will enable both demand reductions during critical peak periods and future solar electric and thermal system installations. The most significant efficiency improvements to the residential standards propose increased thermal performance in exterior walls and attics, tighter ducts located in areas less prone to extreme temperatures than current vented attics, increased installation of high efficacy lighting, and providing a prescriptive option for installation of tankless water heaters. Nonresidential improvements primarily mirror the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) 90.1 updates, and include a handful of improvements beyond ASHRAE.
The 2016 Standards updates are also intended to improve the clarity and organization of these performance-based advanced energy efficiency standards. More detailed information on the proposed changes can be found in Chapter 4.
Overview
The 2016 Standards focus on three key areas: updating requirements for low-rise residential buildings to move closer to California’s zero net energy goal, updating nonresidential and high-rise residential requirements to better align with the national ASHRAE 90.1 standards, and updating the entirety of the existing Standards to improve clarity and consistency, correct errors, streamline requirements, and make adjustments to provisions in the regulations that were found to have unanticipated impacts.
Residential
The proposed changes to the Standards affecting residential construction are as follows:
•Current practice is to place most heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) ducting in uninsulated attic spaces, which can get quite hot in the summer and quite cold in the winter. This, in turn, leads to significant energy losses through unwanted warming or cooling of conditioned air in the ducts, even when the ducts themselves are insulated. The proposed 2016 Standards require builders to reduce such losses, by:
(a) installing ducts so that they have no more than five percent air leakage (the current Standards allow up to six percent); and
(b) reducing the exposure of ducts to extreme heat and cold. This can be accomplished in a number of ways, such as:
i. placing the HVAC equipment and ducts in conditioned spaces;
ii. attaching attic insulation to the underside of the roof (rather than laying it on top of the ceiling);
iii. installing insulating or heat-rejecting roofing materials; or
iv. sealing and insulating the attic in a manner similar to the conditioned rooms in the house.
•For walls, builders must use one or more of several new cost-effective practices or insulation products to reduce heat transfer through exterior walls.
•For lighting, the current Standards designate certain types of residential lighting as “high efficacy lighting”, and require a certain amount of high efficacy lighting within the home. The proposed Standards take the next step of requiring all of the lighting in newly constructed residential buildings to be high efficacy, while also expanding the types of lighting that qualify as high efficacy lighting.
•For water heating, the proposed Standards add a prescriptive option for installation of a gas instantaneous (or tankless) water heater. In addition, the prescriptive option for installing a gas storage water heater requires the installation of
o a compact hot water distribution system; or
o Home Energy Rating System (HERS) verified insulation on all hot water piping.
Nonresidential
The proposed changes are in two basic categories. The first category is incorporation of recent changes in ASHRAE 90.1 (2013). These include:
•Strengthening requirements for heat-flow resistance (more effective insulation) in nonresidential (and high-rise residential) buildings, when builders use the prescriptive approach for compliance. (Note that these requirements establish the performance baseline when using the performance approach.)
•Requiring higher efficiencies in space conditioning equipment.
•Revising the lighting control requirements to be more specific and consistent.
•Adding requirements for elevators to shut off the lights and fans while the cab is empty.
•Adding requirements for escalators and moving walkways in airports, bus stations, and the like to run at a lower, less-energy-consuming speed when not in use.
•Adding requirements that any directly-conditioned space with doors to unconditioned space must be equipped with interlock switches to turn off the space conditioning equipment serving that space while the doors are open.
•Making the requirements for electrical power distribution systems relating to service metering, voltage drop, and disaggregation more energy-conserving.
The second category of proposed changes to the nonresidential Standards align with, but also go beyond, ASHRAE 90.1:
•Lowering Lighting Power Allowances.
•Adding efficiency requirements for Elevator Cab Lighting.
•Adding an interlock requirement for windows and skylights similar to the one for doors.
•The current Standards require that direct digital controls for HVAC equipment must have specified features if they are installed. The proposed Standards require installation of direct digital controls, and add efficiency-supporting requirements for the features and operation of those controls.
Standards Cleanup
The proposed changes to the Standards also include changes throughout the regulations to clarify, simplify, and streamline the existing language and requirements. The most significant of these changes are:
•Acceptance Test Training and Certification – The changes to Title 24 Part 1, Section 10-103A and 10-103B clarify and streamline the approval process for Acceptance Test Training and Certification Providers. Of note, new provisions have been added to allow for amendment of a submitted application, meaning that changes to a submitted or approved application may be made without requiring a complete resubmittal.
•Commissioning – The changes to Title 24, Part 6, Section 120.8, clarify the applicability of building commissioning and correct the use of terms to be consistent with Title 24, Part 1, Section 0-103(a). Importantly, these changes also remove language that incorrectly implied that commissioning was required for alterations, or applied to covered processes. Matching corrections have been made where this Section is referenced in Section 100.0 Table 100-A, and Section 141.0.
•Nonresidential Lighting Alterations – The changes to Part 6, Section 141.0(b)2I simplify and streamline the requirements for lighting alterations. The terms “lighting alteration”, “lighting wiring alteration”, and “luminaire modification” are now clearly separated in what actions each term applies to. For luminaire modifications, the control requirements are being relaxed to require that existing multi-level or automatic shutoff controls remain operable in controlling the luminaires after they are modified, rather than requiring the installation of new multi-level or automatic controls.
•Alternative Calculation Method manuals – The changes to the Alternative Calculation Method manuals adopted as appendices to the Standards combine what was previously two largely identical manuals (for residential and nonresidential building modeling software) into a single manual. This manual provides more explicit and better organized requirements for the approval of compliance software. The requirements that apply to the Compliance Manager software developed by the Energy Commission are now clearly separated from the requirements for approval of vendor software and the requirements for vendor software user manuals. Two appendices have been added to the manual containing the evaluation criteria specific to residential and nonresidential software.
•Charge Indicator Displays – For residential HVAC equipment, the language relating to installation of Charge Indicator Displays has been updated to use the broader term Fault Indicator Displays, recognizing that a display may treat an incorrect charge as a fault while also being able to display other fault conditions or other information.
•Pipe Insulation – For hot water piping, the value for the required level of residential insulation was erroneously removed when the tables were merged in the 2013 update to the Standards. This separate value has been returned to Table 120.3-A.
•Economizers – The requirements for testing and certification of economizer damper leakage to the Energy Commission in order to be installed as part of the prescriptive performance approach of Section 140.4(e)4 have been clarified, and the language expanded to explicitly state who is expected to certify and what information must be provided. In addition, the specification that an economizer is required for each air handler was clarified to be more explicit in where it’s applied.
•Electrical Power Distribution System – Circuit controls for 120v receptacles were clarified and moved to a separate section in 130.5 relating to electrical power distribution systems.
•Fault Detection and Diagnostics – References to pressure sensors were removed, and the word “unitary” removed as an unneeded term.