THE WIRE
Updates to California Energy Codes Energy-efficiency success in California is a big story these days, and new residential lighting standards are playing a significant part. Title 24 and Title 20, two standards set by the California Energy Commission (CEC), are anticipated to continue to add to the energy-saving success of the California Public Utilities Commission’s energy programs. Title 24 serves as the basis for design and construction of buildings in California and Title 20 covers appliance efficiency regulations. Both are in the process of being amended for 2013. Title 24, is amended every three years. According to Gary Flamm, Supervisor, Building Standards Development Unit at the CEC, there are several changes to the 2013 residential requirements in Title 24: ■ Currently, in order to determine if an LED luminaire is high- or low-efficacy, an efficacy calculation is used. With the 2013 changes, a default list is provided. “Instead of making people do the math, we have a list that will simplify this question for most of the non-lighting people,” Flamm explains. ■ In order to be high-efficacy, a luminaire is certified by the manufacturer to the CEC under penalty of perjury, but it has to be a residential fixture. Flamm says there’s been some confusion because a number of luminaires that are certified are not residential. Beyond the efficacy requirement, certification requires a minimum of 90 CRI and a color temperature of 2700K to 4000K for indoor use and 2700K to 5000K for outdoor use. ■ Currently, bathrooms have to be outfitted with all high-efficacy luminaires or lowefficacy luminaires on a vacancy sensor. With the 2013 changes, each bathroom must have a minimum of one high-efficacy luminaire, which can be on any kind of switch, and any low-efficacy luminaires have to be on a vacancy sensor. ■ Luminaires in any rooms classified as “utility” — which include laundry rooms, garages and utility rooms — have to be both high-efficacy and fitted with vacancy sensors. Previously, the requirement was either/or. The 2013 standards were adopted by the Energy Commission on May 31, 2012 and will be printed by the California Building Standard Committee in June 2013. The effective date is Jan. 1, 2014. With the new 2013 standards, residential energy savings over the 2008 standards will be 23.6 GWh per year. Title 20 requires that all regulated appliances sold or offered for sale in California be certified by manufacturers to the CEC. Portable lamps and light bulbs were affected by Title 20 in 2010, when new requirements mandated that lamps sold in the state have dedicated sockets for fluorescent light sources or be sold with a fluorescent bulb — a solution nicknamed “bulb-in-a-box.” As an update to Title 20 in 2013, the CEC has proposed a voluntary California Quality LED lamp standard, which would function similarly to an Energy Star® Plus standard, according to Flamm. Quality LED lamps would need to meet four requirements: a minimum of 90 CRI (only 2700K and 3000K), dimmability, longevity of more than 25,000 hours and be defined as directional or omni-directional. A workshop was hosted by the CEC on Oct. 11 to discuss the voluntary LED specification and American Lighting Assn. (ALA) Director of Engineering Terry McGowan, who is participating on a CEC task force to help develop the standard, spoke on behalf of ALA’s members: “In our view, residential lighting quality is really at the heart of the matter of what we’re discussing here. The quality of light does matter and consumers define that for themselves, especially in their own homes.”