Pennsylvania is taking comments on the 2024 building codes until February 2, 2027

Pennsylvania's Uniform Construction Code Review and Advisory Council opened a 120-day public comment period on the 2024 editions of the International Code Council's model codes on Monday, October 5, 2026. Comments close on Tuesday, February 2, 2027, according to the Department of Labor and Industry's notice in the October 3 Pennsylvania Bulletin.

The International Code Council is a private standards group that rewrites its building, residential and energy codes every three years, and Pennsylvania adopts them, with its own changes, as the Uniform Construction Code, the statewide building code. Re-roofing permits in Conshohocken are reviewed against the edition in force, which today is the 2021 code.

In the last round, the 2021 codes came out on January 31, 2021, and took effect in Pennsylvania on January 1, 2026, 1,796 days later.

01The council's review of the 2021 codes started 620 days after they came out

The council started its review on October 13, 2022, 620 days after the codes were published. It opened a first 120-day comment period that November and a second one on May 1, 2023, which its report says was needed "due to advertisement issues with the first public comment period." Technical advisory committees, panels of volunteers from the trades and code enforcement, reviewed the comments and posted their reports on January 16, 2024.

The council then held three public hearings by Zoom, on February 1, February 29 and March 28, 2024, approved its final report on September 12, 2024, and sent it to the department on October 1. The Independent Regulatory Review Commission approved the rule on October 16, 2025, it was published in the Pennsylvania Bulletin on November 8, 2025, and it took effect on January 1, 2026.

The department's timeline document had planned for the rule to go live on July 13, 2025. The rulemaking phase, from the council's report to publication, ran 403 days.

02The 2024 review reopens 31 extra sections, including the insulation tables

The council has 21 seats, appointed by the governor and the General Assembly, for code officials, engineers, architects, builders and local officials. The department's page lists three seats vacant, including the remodeling contractor's seat and a borough official's seat.

Under the Pennsylvania Construction Code Act, the council can keep a new or amended provision out of the state code if it finds the provision inconsistent with the act or otherwise inappropriate. The act lists what it may weigh: the effect on public health, safety and welfare, economic reasonableness and financial impact, and technical feasibility. When the council rejects a new provision, the act keeps the earlier edition's version in force.

The council also reviews a list of extra sections, ones the International Code Council did not change but that the council chose to reopen. The 2024 list has 31 entries across five codes. In the residential and energy codes it includes the two tables that set insulation and window requirements for ceilings, walls, floors and basements.

03Pennsylvania left the roof chapter alone last time and kept R-49 in the ceiling

The council's 2021 report lists no Pennsylvania change to Chapter 9 of the residential code, Roof Assemblies. That chapter applies here as the International Code Council published it. The state's changes near the roof are in Chapter 8, roof and ceiling framing and attic ventilation, and in the energy chapter.

Pennsylvania kept its own wording on attic vents from earlier editions. The minimum net free vent area, the open area of the vents after screens and louvers, stays at 1/150 of the attic floor area, or 1/300 when 40% to 50% of the vent area sits high in the attic near the ridge. Conshohocken's re-roofing addendum asks the same question in its own words. Pennsylvania also strikes the national line that vents must keep out birds, rodents and snakes.

Pennsylvania also kept a lower minimum for ceiling insulation. R-value measures how well insulation slows heat, and a higher number insulates better. The Department of Energy's county guide puts Montgomery County in climate zone 4A. For that zone Pennsylvania's 2021 residential code sets a ceiling minimum of R-49, while the International Code Council's 2021 energy code lists R-60.

04A roof permit filed this fall or winter stays on the 2021 code

Nothing changes for a permit filed this fall or winter. Conshohocken's addendum says all work must conform to the 2021 International Residential or Building Code, and that holds until a new state rule takes effect. If you are planning a replacement over the next couple of years, ask the borough's Licenses and Inspections office at 610-828-1092 which edition will apply on the date your roofer files, and see the guide to roofing permits in Conshohocken for the forms.

Anyone can comment, homeowners included. The form asks for one code, one chapter and one section or code change number per submission, with a recommendation to adopt, not adopt or adopt with changes, the wording you propose and your reasons. The council's page says a form that covers more than one section will be discarded.

The department has also reopened applications to serve on the technical advisory committees, and the application asks for a resume in PDF form.

05The comment period sets no new requirement and no effective date

06The dates behind the schedule, 2021 round and 2024 review