State Energy Office Roles in Building Energy Codes

State Energy Office involvement in the development, adoption, and implementation of energy codes within each state varies widely. In some states, the State Energy Office leads the development of energy codes or the stretch code and is deeply involved in standard setting, cost-effectiveness evaluation, and managing stakeholder involvement. In other states, another state agency may have purview over energy codes or codes generally, and in some cases, the state building department is responsible for code development and the State Energy Office is granted an advisory seat on the code development committee. Other states, known as home rule, do not have authority to implement a statewide code, leaving code adoption responsibility to local jurisdictions. And sometimes there are more complex state-local code relationships: many localities have no authority to alter state-adopted codes in min/max states; some can only exceed the state code by adopting the statewide stretch code; and some are able to exceed the efficiency requirements of statewide codes without restriction. For more information and specific examples, please see NASEO's Energy Codes 101.

Building energy codes and standards (energy codes) are an effective policy tool for improving a building’s energy efficiency, moderating energy system costs, enhancing energy reliability and resilience by reducing system stresses, and decreasing greenhouse gas and other pollutant emissions from both electricity generation and onsite fuel use. Energy codes establish the minimum legal energy efficiency level to which a new building can be built and existing buildings must achieve following major renovations, repairs, or changes in occupancy in a jurisdiction (which may be a state, city, county, or town, depending on political structures of a state).

To learn more, contact Liepa Braciulyte and Jasmine Xie.

Building energy codes support resilience for individual buildings, communities, and the grid. For individual buildings, energy codes reduce the amount of energy consumed on-site and enable greater "passive survivability". For a structure without backup power, a more efficient, better insulated and air-sealed building envelope can provide the building occupants with shelter and maintain safe indoor air temperatures for a longer period than a structure without these features may be able to provide during outages and extreme weather. For facilities with on-site power generation, efficient buildings can more effectively use emergency power to provide more services or to provide services for a longer period of time (by using less natural gas or other fuels for a generator) during an outage. More efficient structures also reduce demand on the broader electric gird and natural gas system by consuming less fuel for normal operations during extreme weather conditions or periods of supply constraints.

NASEO provides technical support, research assistance, and resources to State Energy Offices when the states evaluate energy code adoption and amendment decisions. In addition, NASEO has partnered with State Energy Offices and the U.S. Department of Energy on energy code field studies in three states, with two additional field studies in expected to begin in 2025. Energy code field studies provide information about construction practices to inform energy code compliance training. In the three completed field studies, NASEO and the host states worked closely to support energy code training for building industry participants including building officials and builders to improve code compliance and ensure cost-effective savings for occupants of new single-family homes.
 
Building energy codes are an effective energy efficiency policy for new buildings when they are supported by enforcement and compliance measures. While the State Energy Office role varies from state to state, there is a spectrum of opportunities to leverage this policy tool in nearly every state, from adoption of new codes to supporting implementation through code compliance field studies and workforce training programs. States that seek to improve energy efficiency and resilience across their new and existing buildings can look to building energy codes and access a variety of technical assistance from the U.S. DOE Building Energy Codes Program, including training modules, help desk support, publications, impact analyses, compliance tools and software, and access to a national technical assistance network.
 

In addition to resources available from NASEO, U.S. DOE resources are available for state technical assistance and describing the benefits of energy codes for energy resilience.