Seattle City Wire

On May 24, 2023, the State Building Code Council (SBCC) held a special meeting to discuss the 9th Circuit that found the City of Berkeley’s Energy Code violated federal preemption over state rules and a new lawsuit against the State Codes for a similar violation. In the new lawsuit, several organizations are seeking to prevent enforcement of the Washington State Energy Code’s ban on natural gas appliances that are regulated under the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA).  The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Washington.

The SBCC voted to delay implementing the 2021 Codes, through emergency rulemaking, for 120 days starting from June 30. This makes the State implementation date October 29, 2023.

SDCI will evaluate options for revised code language in our 2021 Commercial Energy Code, based on this new lawsuit. Additionally, we are reviewing the risk associated with continuing to prohibit fossil fuel appliances under the 2018 Seattle Commercial Energy Code.

With the 2021 Code implementation delay from the SBCC, SDCI implement the 2021 Seattle Codes no sooner than October 29, 2023.

There will be further updates, meetings, and discussions as we move forward. We will post updates on SDCI’s 2021 Seattle  Code Adoption webpage.

Please contact Micah Chappell for any questions at micah.chappell@seattle.gov.

Original source can be found here.