---
kind: "section"
citation: "42 U.S.C. § 6831"
title: "42"
title_heading: "The Public Health and Welfare"
number: "6831"
heading: "Congressional findings and purpose"
release: "119-102"
date: "2026-07-12"
url: "https://uscodex.org/usc/42/6831"
units:
  - "Chapter 81 — Energy Conservation and Resource Renewal"
  - "Subchapter II — Energy Conservation Standards for New Buildings"
---

# §6831. Congressional findings and purpose

- (a) The Congress finds that—
  - (1) large amounts of fuel and energy are consumed unnecessarily each year in heating, cooling, ventilating, and providing domestic hot water for newly constructed residential and [commercial buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=4) because such [buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=2) lack adequate energy conservation features;
  - (2) Federal voluntary performance standards for newly constructed [buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=2) can prevent such waste of energy, which the Nation can no longer afford in view of its current and anticipated energy shortage;
  - (3) the failure to provide adequate [energy conservation measures](/usc/42/8262.md?p=5) in newly constructed [buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=2) increases long-term operating costs that may affect adversely the repayment of, and security for, loans made, insured, or guaranteed by [Federal agencies](/usc/42/6802.md?p=3) or made by federally insured or regulated instrumentalities; and
  - (4) [State](/usc/42/6802.md?p=6) and local [building codes](/usc/42/6832.md?p=3) or similar controls can provide an existing means by which to assure, in coordination with other [building](/usc/42/6832.md?p=2) requirements and with a minimum of Federal interference in [State](/usc/42/6802.md?p=6) and local transactions, that newly constructed [buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=2) contain adequate energy conservation features.
- (b) The purposes of this subchapter, therefore, are to—
  - (1) redirect Federal policies and [practices](/usc/42/17061.md?p=19) to assure that reasonable energy conservation features will be incorporated into new commercial and [residential buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=9) receiving [Federal financial assistance](/usc/42/6832.md?p=7);
  - (2) provide for the development and implementation, as soon as practicable, of voluntary performance standards for new residential and [commercial buildings](/usc/42/6832.md?p=4) which are designed to achieve the maximum practicable improvements in energy efficiency and increases in the use of nondepletable sources of energy; and
  - (3) encourage [States](/usc/42/6802.md?p=6) and local governments to adopt and enforce such standards through their existing [building codes](/usc/42/6832.md?p=3) and other [construction](/usc/42/300s–3.md?p=7) control mechanisms, or to apply them through a special approval process.

## Source credit

(Pub. L. 94–385, title III, § 302, Aug. 14, 1976, 90 Stat. 1144; Pub. L. 97–35, title X, § 1041(a), Aug. 13, 1981, 95 Stat. 621.)

## Notes

### Editorial Notes

### Amendments

1981—Subsecs. (a)(2), (b)(2). Pub. L. 97–35 inserted “voluntary” before “performance standards”.

### Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

### Effective Date of 1981 Amendment

Amendment by Pub. L. 97–35 effective Aug. 13, 1981, see section 1038 of Pub. L. 97–35, set out as a note under section 6240 of this title.

### Short Title

For short title of this subchapter as the “Energy Conservation Standards for New Buildings Act of 1976”, see section 301 of Pub. L. 94–385, set out as a note under section 6801 of this title.