by Shane Henson — April 2, 2012—A new report from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), Third Parties in the Implementation of Building Energy Codes in China , asserts that China has dramatically improved its compliance rate with building energy codes in only five years. In the report, a third party refers to a company not affiliated with developers and regulatory bodies, but directly or indirectly involved in the process of ensuring compliance with building energy codes.
China is now the largest market for new construction in the world, adding about 20 billion square feet to its commercial and residential building stock annually in recent years, notes the report. Given this scale, enforcement of building energy codes across China is challenging and critical for both Chinese and global building energy efficiency and carbon mitigation. Compliance with building energy codes has been reported as low, but a few new studies indicate that China has actually made great strides in improving compliance since 2005.
In 2005, the Chinese government launched a series of national policies and projects to promote the enforcement of building energy codes. According to the country’s annual national inspection of building energy efficiency (which surveys four megacities, the majority of 30 provincial capitals, and two randomly selected cities in each province), compliance rates in large and medium-sized cities have risen from 53% (design stage) and 21% (construction stage) in 2005 to 99.5% and 95.4%, respectively, in 2010.
The energy code compliance rate in China is defined as compliance with mandatory items in building energy codes at both the design and construction stages. The reported compliance rates do not take into account small towns and rural areas. Some international building experts have suggested that the definition of compliance needs to be improved. Nevertheless, the compliance rates point to the strong performance of the overarching institutions, including the functioning of third parties, between 2005 and 2010, note the report’s authors.
Factors contributing to China’s success include: strong regulatory support; multiple agencies involved in compliance efforts; the employment and transparent management of third parties (there were 5,500 certified construction inspection companies as of 2009); and clear penalties for non-compliance.
