Program Highlights - August/September 2007
Welcome to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Building Energy Codes Program's (BECP) monthly highlights. These highlights provide the latest information on our work to increase the energy efficiency of the nation's commercial and residential buildings.
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 Working with ASHRAE — DOE's 30% Codes Initiative
DOE's 30% Codes Initiative is focused on helping the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) achieve its goal of 30% energy savings above ANSI/ASHRAE/IESNA¹ Standard 90.1-2004 by 2010. To this end, BECP is addressing the three critical elements of building energy use: lighting, mechanical, and envelope.
- Lighting — BECP worked as part of ASHRAE's lighting subcommittee to identify a source of consistent lighting-cost data, which will be used as part of a cost database being developed to support proposal analysis toward ASHRAE's and DOE's 30% energy savings goal. The subcommittee also continued to develop an expanded control requirements section.
- Mechanical and Envelope — BECP worked as part of ASHRAE's mechanical and envelope subcommittees to develop prototypes for simulating the energy behavior of commercial buildings over a range of climates, sizes, and building types, which will be used to revise Standard 90.1.
Energy Codes 2007 Presentations Available
Presentations from Energy Codes 2007 and a final attendees list are now available on BECP's website.
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Updates to IECC
On behalf of DOE, BECP prepared a code change proposal to update Section 506 in the 2006 International Energy Conservation Code® (IECC). The proposal is intended to provide simple and more detailed modeling guidelines for total building performance compliance using building simulation.
Updates to ASHRAE
A proposal to update Section 11 of ASHRAE Standard 90.1 was prepared to make the requirements and format consistent across IECC and ASHRAE.
Northwest States are Raising the Bar
BECP's Diana Shankle and Pam Cole attended the Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance (NEEA) quarterly meeting, September 6, 2007, in Seattle, Washington. As part of this meeting, the NEEA states provided updates on state code activity.
- Oregon is upgrading its residential code to be 15% more stringent than the 2006 IECC. Oregon's current residential code, which is already ahead of the curve, is an amended version of the 2003 International Residential Code®; Oregon's current commercial code exceeds ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2004.
- Idaho will adopt the 2006 IECC, effective January 1, 2008. The state will also have new legislative language, such that its codes must be updated every three years. State buildings in Idaho will need to achieve more than 30% energy efficiency as compared to the 2006 IECC per new code requirements on commissioning in the works.
- Montana is adopting the 2006 IECC with amendments, effective January 1, 2008.
- Washington passed a new residential fenestration requirement for Eastern Washington of an area weighted U-factor of 0.30.
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Get the Latest Software!
COMcheck™ 3.5.0 offers exterior lighting compliance features for the IECC 2006 and ASHRAE 90.1-2004 codes. The new version also includes an update of the New York code based on IECC 2003.
REScheck™ 4.1.1 provides an upgraded DOE2 simulation engine used in limited-scope building performance evaluations.
The latest REScheck-Web offers support for the 2006 IECC.
Software Helps Achieve Compliance
COMcheck and REScheck users accessed BECP's compliance software 29,005 and 20,379 times respectively in August and September combined.
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Technical Assistance to Users
Got code questions? We've got code answers. In August and September, BECP received and responded to 637 Technical Support inquiries from the energy codes community. Email your questions to BECP Technical Support at techsupport@becp.pnl.gov, or submit an inquiry online.
Technical Assistance to States
Montana
BECP's analysis for Montana of the energy savings associated with slab insulation in small commercial buildings is now available on BECP's website. Read the full report, Montana Slab Edge Insulation Analysis for 2006 IECC Adoption.
West Virginia
BECP's analysis of the energy savings and economic impact for upgrading the West Virginia residential building code to the 2003 IECC is now available on BECP's website. Read the full report, Energy Efficiency of the 2003 International Energy Conservation Code in West Virginia.
Wyoming
BECP is analyzing the energy and economic impact of adopting the 2006 IECC as the state code for residential buildings in Wyoming.
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Visit BECP at the AHR Expo
BECP staff will attend the International Air-Conditioning, Heating, Refrigerating Exposition (AHR Expo), January 22-24, 2008 in New York. The AHR Expo will be held in conjunction with the ASHRAE winter meetings, January 19-23, 2008.
See BECP's New Tutorials
Six new tutorials are available for COMcheck 101 and REScheck 101 on the Online Training site. These tutorials are short video clips with audio that cover the basics, including a QuickStart tutorial and a tutorial for each major screen.
Surf BECP's Website
BECP's website has a wealth of resources for the energy codes community. Visit www.energycodes.gov for training, software, news, and more! Website hits totaled 2,970,829 in August and 3,251,058 in September.
Calendar of Events
Advertise to the community! BECP invites website visitors to add a training or event for the building energy codes community on its Calendar of Events — a community source for buildings-related conferences and workshops as well as national energy code training and state energy code training conducted across the nation. In September, 14 events were added to the calendar.
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Program Highlights Archives
¹The American National Standards Institute/ASHRAE/Illuminating Engineering Society of North America
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