Lighting and Appliances
Core concepts
Lighting. The residential chapter requires that permanently installed lighting be high efficacy, expressed either as a percentage of fixtures/luminaires or as a minimum lamp efficacy, depending on edition. Critical distinctions:
- Permanently installed fixtures count; plug-in and portable lamps generally do not.
- Requirements may be written in terms of lumens per watt rather than technology type, so "LED" is not automatically the answer - the efficacy value is.
- Recessed luminaires in the thermal envelope must be sealed/airtight and rated for contact with insulation where required, or they become an air-leakage and insulation-compression problem.
- Exterior lighting and controls may be regulated separately.
Appliances. The energy code itself regulates few appliances; most appliance efficiency comes from federal standards and ENERGY STAR, referenced rather than restated. What the code does address in residential work typically includes pool pumps and heaters, and sometimes ceiling fans and spa equipment. The inspector's job is generally to verify that specified equipment meets the referenced efficiency and is labeled - not to test appliances.
Traps
- Counting plug-in lamps toward the high-efficacy percentage.
- Treating an LED fixture as compliant when its efficacy in lm/W falls below the threshold.
- Forgetting that a recessed can penetrating the ceiling plane is both an envelope and a lighting issue.
- Assuming all appliances are code-enforced by the energy inspector.
- Ignoring owner-supplied vs. builder-installed fixtures when computing percentages.
Worked example (rule of thumb)
If the requirement is that a percentage of permanently installed luminaires contain only high-efficacy lamps, count only fixtures fastened to the structure. Twenty permanent fixtures with a 90% requirement means at least 18 must comply; a table lamp on a nightstand is irrelevant to the calculation.