Proposed Law Puts Thumb on the Scale Against Building Codes That Force Fuel Switching

The “Path to Affordable Homes Act of 2025” sounds like it’s about making housing cheaper, but Section 2 focuses entirely on how the Department of Energy (DOE) reviews national building energy efficiency standards. Essentially, this bill changes the rules of the road for updating energy codes, and it introduces a significant hurdle for any code that promotes electrification.

The New Review Timeline and Criteria

Currently, the DOE reviews updates to major model energy codes, like those from ASHRAE or the International Energy Conservation Code (IECC), and decides whether to adopt them into federal standards. This bill mandates that the DOE must make that decision within one year of the new model code being approved. That’s a clear timeline, which is helpful for predictability.

When reviewing these updates, the Secretary must evaluate three things: the update’s cost-effectiveness, its technological feasibility, and its potential impact on electric grid reliability. For example, if a new code requires expensive, unproven technology or might overload the local power grid, the DOE is supposed to factor that in. This is about making sure efficiency standards are practical and don’t instantly make construction costs skyrocket.

The Fossil Fuel Hurdle

Here’s where the bill takes a hard turn: Section 2 introduces a specific constraint on the DOE’s decision-making process. If the Secretary determines that a proposed energy code update would “force a building to switch the type of energy it consumes or the source that generates that energy,” they must treat that finding as a “negative factor” against adopting the update.

In plain English, this targets the growing trend of “electrification”—moving buildings away from natural gas or oil for things like heating and hot water, and toward electric alternatives like heat pumps. If a new, highly efficient building code essentially mandates that a home or office must switch from fossil fuels to electricity, this bill puts a thumb on the scale against adopting that code federally.

What This Means for Your Wallet and the Grid

For a homebuyer or renter, this provision has two sides. On one hand, it could prevent federal standards from imposing costly, immediate mandates on builders that would be passed directly to the consumer in the form of higher purchase prices or rents. If you’re a developer, you might see this as regulatory relief, helping keep initial construction costs down.

On the other hand, highly efficient, all-electric homes often have significantly lower long-term operating costs. By making it harder for the DOE to adopt codes that push for electrification, this bill might lock in higher utility bills for future homeowners and businesses. You might save a few thousand upfront on the build, but end up paying more every month for the next 30 years. It also potentially slows down efforts to reduce carbon emissions from the building sector, which is a major environmental concern. The weight of this “negative factor” is not quantified, meaning the Secretary has discretion, but the intent to protect the status quo of fossil fuel use in buildings is clear.