Division I regional track finals
Fenwick graduation 2012
Ponitz graduation 2012
Home > Blogs > Ohio politics > Archives > 2009 > May > 12 > Entry
To cash in, Ohio must update codes
Ohio needs to adopt new building codes if it wants access to a $25 billion pot of federal stimulus money for energy efficiency projects, according to Environment Ohio.
The group is pushing Ohio officials to follow the lead of other states and adopt the 2009 International Energy Conservation Code for commercial and residential buildings.
Environment Ohio released a report Wednesday May 13 that says 40 percent of American energy use goes toward powering buildings and much is wasted through poor insulation, leaky windows and inefficient lighting, heating and cooling. All this contributes to global warming because fossil fuels are burned to generate most of the power used in Ohio, the report said.
Ohio could be in line to receive $96.1 million from the U.S. Department of Energy’s state energy program but the state needs to update its building codes, Environment Ohio said.
Ohio Consumers’ Counsel Janine Migden-Ostrander said energy efficiency is good for consumers.
“By adopting higher building code standards, utility costs and energy use can be minimized,” Migden-Ostrander said. “If Ohioans are able to use less energy because more existing and new homes are made more energy efficient, hundreds of dollars per year could be saved in utility costs. With more stringent building codes, Ohio can defer and hopefully avoid the need to build costly power plants at the expense of residential consumers.”
Environment Ohio said other states, including Michigan, Indiana, Illinois and West Virginia, are moving to adopt the most up-to-date building codes so that they can get federal stimulus money.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment |
Comments
By Jeff
May 13, 2009 4:13 PM | Link to this
Besides updatig the code, Ohio and the City of Dayton need to simplify the code. As it is, building and remodelling are difficult and not cost effective. Or maybe that’s a result of the people involved in the review and inspection process…