As California continues to recover from the devastating wildfires that ravaged large areas of Southern California in January, the state has taken steps designed to better protect urban areas from the future threat of wildfires.
California recently adopted the 2024 International Wildland-Urban Interface Code as the basis for Title 24, Part 7, 2025 California Wildland-Urban Interface Code to address escalating wildfire risks, enhance fire resilience with science-based standards and set the benchmark for safer, more sustainable communities in fire-prone areas.
The code’s adoption is the result of a collaboration between the CAL FIRE Office of the State Fire Marshal, the California Fire Prevention Officers, California Building Officials, the International Code Council, the California Building Industry Association, and wildfire stakeholders, culminating with rulemaking by the California Building Standards Commission.
“While these aren’t necessarily new requirements, it’s a reorganization of many sections into a singular code with the goal of making it easier for local officials to ensure that new homes and buildings built in wildfire-prone areas have an increased chance of surviving a wildfire,” said Daniel Berlant, California State Fire Marshal.
“With the help of expert volunteers, CAL FIRE’s Office of the State Fire Marshal has shifted the basis of Title-24’s Wildland Urban Interface standards to a nationally developed model code,” said Stuart D. Tom, immediate past president of the Code Council and superintendent of building and fire for Pasadena, California. “By utilizing this model code, California will benefit from the continual code development cycle that the code council uses to ensure that all its codes are the best in the world,”
Title 24, Part 7 replaces the previous Title 24, Chapter 7A of the California Building Code –Materials and Construction Methods for Exterior Wildfire Exposure adopted in 2005.
Dan Hounsell is senior editor for the facilities market. He has more than 30 years of experience writing about facilities maintenance, engineering and management.?
