Title 24 Reports in Santa Cruz

Santa Cruz is climate zone 3 in every one of its ZIP codes, so the zone is settled before a project starts. What sets the city apart is its own energy ordinance: a single-family addition or alteration of 350 square feet or more adds measures from a local menu on top of the state code.

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The 350-square-foot line

Ordinance 2025-19 is one of the local standards the Energy Commission has approved as going further than the 2025 Energy Code; the approval came on 21 January 2026. It does two things. New single-family homes take on electric-readiness requirements, and an existing single-family home undergoing an addition or alteration of 350 square feet or more has to choose from a menu of energy efficiency and electrification options. The Building & Safety Division publishes a guide and a form for these major residential additions and alterations.

Measure early, because the line is sharp. A 340-square-foot family room stays under it; a 360-square-foot one does not, and an alteration of 350 square feet or more counts in the same way as an addition.

What it changes in the report

The local menu does not replace anything. The Title 24 report still has to show that the addition or alteration meets the 2025 Energy Code on its own terms, and the City's form then records which menu options were chosen. Several of those options touch the same equipment and envelope the report models, so settle the menu choice first. An electrification option chosen after the report is finished, a heat pump for instance, means running the calculations again.

Commercial heating and cooling replacements

A second ordinance, 2025-22, approved by the Energy Commission on 26 May 2026, reaches existing nonresidential buildings. When a space-conditioning system is altered it steers the owner toward an air-source heat pump, while still allowing an air conditioner if additional efficiency measures come with it. On a tenant improvement or a rooftop unit change-out, that decision belongs in the scope before the nonresidential forms are drawn up.

More than a quarter of the city is coastal

About 3.6 of the city's roughly 12.7 square miles sit inside the Coastal Zone. The City keeps permit authority across most of it, but development there needs a Coastal Development Permit and can be appealed to the California Coastal Commission. An ADU in the Coastal Zone needs a coastal permit as well unless it is exempt or excluded, although no public hearing is held for it.

Submitting, and the faster ADU lane

Applications and plan sets go to the Building & Safety Division of the Community Development Department electronically, and eTRAKiT shows plan-check status once you have a City login. Every new application is checked against the 2025 California Building Standards Codes and Title 18 of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code, which is where the local energy amendments sit. Detached ADUs have a quicker route: under AB 1332 the City runs a pre-approved ADU program offering a 30-day review and lower-cost permitting for detached units.

The zone itself only changes over the hill. Scotts Valley, Capitola, Aptos and Watsonville are zone 3 like the city, while Los Gatos, over the summit on Highway 17, is zone 4, and so is 95033, the ZIP code for the mountain area around the summit.

Common Title 24 Questions in Santa Cruz

Santa Cruz projects fall in California climate zone 3. The zone drives the envelope and equipment requirements a report has to meet, and a single city can span more than one, so it is confirmed per address.

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