Builders say they expect the most significant changes will involve insulation and other aspects of energy efficiency.
Connecticut’s building code is updated regularly from what had been an amalgamation of model code elements from the International Code Council, the National Fire Protection Association and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers, among others. In preparation for the newest changes, a building code amendment committee of the Connecticut Department of Administrative Services has congregated 15 times this year, including a Hartford meeting scheduled for Thursday with two more meetings on tap before year end.
The state has yet to set a firm date for adoption of a fully revised building code, except to say it is targeting the spring of 2016.
Bill Ethier, CEO of the Home Builders & Remodelers Association of Connecticut, said it’s no easy feat keeping up with the amendments, with Connecticut’s building code filling multiple volumes of print books.
“Any business or profession or endeavor — you need to know the rules,” Ethier said. “The contracting business is tough because the rules change every three or six years.”
The American Institute of Architects and other groups began pushing in the 1970s for harmonized codes across local and state boundaries, as residential building companies became regional in scale, and as new federal laws like the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 forced widespread changes in building codes.
Fast forward to 2016, and AIA’s Connecticut chapter has scheduled six full days of seminars covering all the newest changes to the state’s building codes. On Nov. 19, the Home Builders and Remodelers Association of Fairfield County will hold its own forum at Ring’s End in Stratford, with Connecticut’s deputy state building inspector on hand to discuss the pending new rules.
“Building technology advances, I think, in ways that consumers cannot fathom,” said Diane Harp Jones, AIA Connecticut’s CEO. “Literally every day there is better, improved science in the way we make buildings. Architects can design to anything — but it’s much more protective ... if building and fire safety codes are not in conflict.”
Connecticut and other states reject some measures for the sheer cost of implementation, noted Ethier — for instance, NFPA recommendations that sprinklers be mandated in new homes, with California, Maryland and Washington, D.C., having adopted the requirement for newly built homes, adding tens of thousands of dollars to the cost of construction.
But many code addenda are motivated by the goal of saving money over the life of the structure, whether by limiting wasted energy or by limiting accidents or damage from extreme events like hurricanes. In the wake of Superstorm Sandy in 2012, builders are expecting Connecticut to increase the ability of coastal homes to withstand high winds and water through reinforced walls and elevated foundations.
In a study published in October by the Florida Solar Energy Center examining the financial impact of a quarter-century’s revisions to Florida’s building code, researchers estimated at 13 percent the overall savings the newer building code produced. While that was well under the 50 percent savings Florida officials had predicted would occur in 1985 in enacting new regulations, that forecast did not factor in the vastly larger homes that would be become the norm, as well as particulars of the homes themselves such as the increased appliances households would install.
If it is a lot to assimilate for the average homeowner, all the more so for your local contractor.
“It’s hugely sophisticated and all the more so because we have to be the subject-matter experts,” said Bill Janhonen, a building and energy efficiency consultant who owns WSJ Enterprises in Norwalk. “As long as we live under caveat emptor, it’s really the responsibility of the individual to know. You have to do your due diligence and make sure you hire the right expert.”
©2015 The Advocate (Stamford, Conn.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
