Part 9 Handbook
The new Illustrated User's Guide – NBC 2020: Part 9 of Division B, Housing and Small Buildings is now available. This guide is designed to assist builders and designers in understanding the National Building Code of Canada (NBC) 2020 as it applies to housing and small buildings. It provides detailed explanations of the principles and rationale behind the Part 9 provisions.
This new edition of the guide continues to offer a wealth of information, including hundreds of graphics, examples and calculations, making it an effective resource for the construction and design sectors.
Key updates
This edition provides updated guidance on several key areas critical to modern building practices, including safety measures for openable windows in buildings of residential occupancy, fire protection measures for home-type care occupancies, and provisions for penetrations of fire separations by outlet boxes, service equipment, raceways, sprinklers and fire dampers. It also provides new information on vapour barrier materials, connectors and fasteners in contact with preservative-treated wood, and the location of exhaust outlets to ensure proper building ventilation.
The guide now covers airtightness testing for the building envelope and introduces energy performance tiers, which provide a flexible compliance framework for achieving higher levels of energy efficiency in housing and small buildings. This framework includes a prescriptive trade-off path with energy conservation measures that can be credited with energy conservation points to attain Energy Performance Tier 2.
Intended audience
The guide is valuable for builders and designers, providing practical guidance on compliance with NBC Part 9 and examples to help professionals meet code provisions. Building and fire officials will benefit from the insight into the scientific background of Part 9 provisions, which aids in understanding the Code. Trainers and educators will also find it a helpful reference tool for teaching students about the design and construction of housing and small buildings, illustrating key principles of accepted practice.
By providing relevant cross-referenced code information, the guide is a useful complement to the National Building Code of Canada 2020.
The Illustrated User's Guide – NBC 2020: Part 9 of Division B, Housing and Small Buildings is available for free, in electronic format, through the National Research Council of Canada’s (NRC’s) Publications Archive and for purchase, in printed format, from the NRC's Virtual Store.
The NRC's Codes Canada group supports the Harmonized National Model Code Development System as the secretariat, by providing technical, policy and administrative support. As part of this support, the NRC also publishes the National Model Codes—including the National Building Code of Canada, the National Fire Code of Canada, the National Plumbing Code of Canada, and the National Energy Code of Canada for Buildings—and the supporting user's guides.