National Electrical Code 2023 Revision Costs Draw Debate
Electrical safety has surfaced as a pawn in the rising debate about housing affordability.
Citing its potential impact on the cost of new homes, the mayor of Omaha, Neb., recently vetoed a narrowly approved city council measure that would have effectively required expanded GFCI and surge protection in new single-family residential construction. The Nov. 14, 2024, veto — and subsequent failure of an override — means the city is on course to adopt something close to the amended version of the 2023 National Electrical Code the state adopted that pointedly carves out those and several other provisions.
Backers of the city taking a different course than the state argued homeowners would be safer at a reasonable boost to the price of a home. Opponents countered that forcing builders to incorporate more questionably valuable electrical safety features into homes ran directly counter to the city’s growing focus on making housing more affordable for residents.
That was the argument that carried the day in the Nebraska state legislature earlier this year, teeing up Omaha’s debate. Testimony at city council hearings on the matter of NEC adoption referenced the legislature’s concern with the impact of regulations on affordability generally and the new electrical code’s GFCI and surge protection clauses specifically. In hearings on NEC adoption at the state capital, state homebuilder interests reportedly shared their affordability concerns and electrical industry voices their overarching safety concerns, mainly via International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers witnesses.
The legislature’s action appears to be in line with suggested amendments to the 2023 NEC issued by the National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) in April 2023. In that document, prepared for state and local homebuilders associations as a guide for challenging code elements potentially unfavorable to builders, NAHB trains its sights on specific GFCI, AFCI, and surge protection requirements. In many instances, their negative impact on building costs is highlighted.
Arguing against the new code’s expanded requirement for GFCI protection for receptacles serving 240V appliances, for instance, NAHB says its inclusion is “premature” partly because nuisance tripping problems haven’t been solved. At a minimum, it says, the cost for adding that protection to a new home in 2019 was around $272. That’s close to the estimated cost of adding AFCI protection to homes, another new code requirement it opposes, an amount that “may not sound like much may not sound like much when compared to the overall cost of a home, but this is only one of many regulations which adds cost for new homebuyers. Every $859 increase in construction costs adds an additional $1,000 to the final price of the home.”
NAHB’s suggested amendments document says expanded GFCI coverage will have diminishing returns on safety. It says data shows consumer product-related electrocutions have indeed fallen as GFCIs have been required in more home locations, especially in wet or damp locations (see Figure). But the new requirement for GFCIs in broadly defined kitchen areas won’t translate to reduced risk, it says, because handheld electrical devices are unlikely to come near sink areas.
That cost-benefit tradeoff was the essence of the debate that played out in Omaha city council chambers. November council session recordings reveal a sharp divide between those prioritizing safety at a reasonable cost and others who came down on the side of keeping a lid on building costs, perhaps at all costs.
Whether the price tag of restoring the state’s code carve-outs to the city’s code was $700 to $2,000 per house — the range of estimates floated — council member Danny Begley, who is employed as vice president of IBEW Local 1483, said safety and affordability can co-exist in this case. “It isn’t that we’re pushing back on affordable housing,” he said. “The question is, what safety measures do we want to have in a new house that is built?”
And electrical safety in the home is not a hypothetical concern, another IBEW representative reminded the council. Jon Nebel, with IBEW Local 22, cited Consumer Products Safety Commission data showing between 2011 and 2020, there were 84 electrocutions in residences tied to working on appliances, deaths that could have been prevented with adequate GFCI protection.
But council members who ended up defeating the measure said deleting the NEC’s added safety provisions amounted to a good place to make a stand against rising home prices. Pointing out that owners of new homes will have the same acceptable margin of electrical safety that most owners of existing homes currently have, council member Don Rowe said cost of entry for new homeowners should take precedent.
“When we stack on more costs it’s making it much more difficult for builders to produce a product that’s affordable,” he said. “We’re short on units in the city and then we want to make it more difficult for them to build? I find it hard to comprehend why we would do that when there’s an opportunity to still safely build a house and lower the costs for the end buyer.”
