In November 1999, the Pennsylvania Legislature passed ACT 45, known as the Uniform Construction Code, into law mandating a statewide building code across Pennsylvania. Act 45 requires the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry (DLI) to promulgate regulations to implement the requirements of the legislation and, in addition, to consider the development of alternative prescriptive methods for energy conservation that account for the various climatic regions within the Commonwealth. In deriving these energy standards, the DLI was to seek to balance energy savings with initial construction costs.