Title 24 Reports in Sunnyvale
Sunnyvale is climate zone 4 in all 4 of its street ZIP codes, like Mountain View and Palo Alto. What sets it apart is a local rule for one of the commonest jobs in an older house: replacing the air conditioner.
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An air conditioner swap with conditions
Section 16.43.070 of the municipal code, part of the city's 2025 code update, covers an air conditioner installed or replaced in an existing single-family home in climate zone 4. The altered system has to take one of two routes. The first makes a heat pump the primary source of heat, with a gas furnace or electric resistance allowed as back-up. The second keeps a straight air conditioner and adds a package of measures: duct leakage tested at 10 percent or less on existing ducts, airflow of at least 300 cfm per ton with fan efficacy no worse than 0.45 W/cfm, verified refrigerant charge, and in a vented attic insulation to R-49 with the ceiling plane air-sealed, unless R-38 is already there.
Most of those are field verifications by an ECC-Rater, so the second route costs a test visit and often attic work. Which route a homeowner takes is a decision to make before the equipment is ordered, not at final inspection.
Approved once, waiting on the 2025 review
The rule first appeared in Ordinance 3244-25, adopted on 26 August 2025, and the Energy Commission approved it against the 2022 Energy Code on 12 November 2025. The 2025-cycle version came with the city's code update, and on 11 August 2026 the council adopted Ordinance 3260-26 to add cost-effectiveness findings ahead of the Commission's review. Sunnyvale is not yet on the Commission's list for the 2025 code. Mountain View's version (Ordinance 9.2025) and Palo Alto's (5665) are. Anyone quoting change-outs in Sunnyvale should confirm with the Building Division how the rule is being applied while that review is open.
The gas rule is gone; new homes meet the state code
Sunnyvale's 2020 reach code required newly constructed buildings to be all-electric. The council suspended those requirements on 21 May 2024, and Ordinance 3248-25 repealed them from 1 January 2026. A new house is now modelled to the statewide 2025 Energy Code, which applies to applications submitted on or after 1 January 2026.
Most of the new housing is apartments
The Department of Finance counts 1,384 homes added in Sunnyvale in 2025, and 1,083 of them were multifamily, the ninth-largest multifamily gain of any California city. The Moffett Park Specific Plan, adopted on 11 July 2023, plans for a net 20,000 more. Multifamily buildings follow their own compliance documents: LMCC certificates up to three habitable stories and NRCC certificates from four.
A mailing ZIP is not a site
The Energy Commission's table lists 94088, a Sunnyvale post-office-box ZIP, as zone 3. A PO box is not where the building is. Projects are filed through the One-Stop Permit Center's E-OneStop Online Services portal, which also takes SolarAPP+ rooftop solar approvals, and the zone on the report comes from the street address.
Common Title 24 Questions in Sunnyvale
- Do I need a Title 24 report to replace an air conditioner in Sunnyvale?
- Is Sunnyvale in the same climate zone as Mountain View?
- Does a four-storey Sunnyvale apartment building use NRCC forms?
- Does a Sunnyvale ADU from the plans gallery need its own energy report?
- What does the Sunnyvale One-Stop Permit Center check in the energy forms?
- Do Sunnyvale office tenant improvements need Title 24?
- How much does a Title 24 report cost in Sunnyvale?
Sunnyvale projects fall in California climate zone 4. 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.