Title 24: What's new

Yesterday I went to an informative seminar at the San Francisco American Institute of Architects office about the upcoming changes to "Title 24" (somewhat of a misnomer). Martyn Dodd of EnergySoft covered some exciting energy efficiency regulations to look forward to on January 1st 2010 including new forms and more complicated calculations. Cool roofs will be required on more structures. Exterior building elements will have to achieve lower U-factors (heat transferred through a building assembly per unit of time per unit of area). And because we are making our buildings tighter and tighter we will now need to provide continuous mechanical ventilation. I continue to be skeptical that this is the best way to achieve energy efficiency in San Francisco.