California Energy Code Compliance field testing for builders and contractors.

The 2025 Energy Code took effect on January 1, 2026, and it applies based on when the permit application was filed — not when construction starts and not when the plans were drawn. If your application was submitted on or after that date, you are on the 2025 Energy Code. Projects with applications filed before it remain on the previous cycle. Tell us your application date when you send plans and we will model to the correct cycle.

Three things matter most in practice. The code expanded heat pump requirements for newly constructed residential buildings, pushing heat pump space and water heating into the baseline rather than treating it as an alternative. It broadened electric-readiness provisions, so buildings that install gas equipment now have to be wired and spaced for later electric replacement. And it strengthened ventilation requirements. Multifamily requirements also continue to diverge from single-family in ways that catch design teams out.

They are the three stages of the residential compliance chain. The CF1R is the Certificate of Compliance — the design-stage document we produce from your plans and submit with the permit application. The CF2R is the Certificate of Installation, completed by the installing contractor. The CF3R is the Certificate of Verification, issued by a certified California Energy Code Compliance rater after field testing. Where measures require California Energy Code Compliance field testing, all three must be registered with an approved data registry before final sign-off. Nonresidential projects use the parallel NRCC, NRCI and NRCA series.

It depends on the measures your design relies on for compliance, which is exactly why the report and the testing should be scoped together. Common triggers include ducts located outside conditioned space, refrigerant charge verification on split systems, quality insulation installation, high-performance attics and walls, whole-house fans and various ventilation measures. If your CF1R calls for a measure requiring verification and nobody performs it, you will not get final sign-off.

Yes, for Title 24 compliance purposes. Effective 1 January 2026, alongside the 2025 Energy Code, the California Energy Commission replaced the field verification and diagnostic testing portion of the HERS Program with the Energy Code Compliance Program. HERS Raters became California Energy Code Compliance raters and HERS Providers became California Energy Code Compliance providers. The testing itself has not changed — duct leakage, blower door, refrigerant charge, airflow and QII are the same procedures. If someone on your project still says HERS, they almost certainly mean California Energy Code Compliance field testing.

Same-day reports are available. Send complete plans and tell us the deadline — if it is today, say so and we will work to it. Same-day expedite is priced up front at $95, never invented when you are desperate. What actually slows a report down is almost never the modelling; it is incomplete drawings. Window schedules, insulation values, equipment efficiencies and orientation are the four things most often missing.