The first-ever comprehensive review of the Ontario Building Code has a mandate to root out duplications, anachronisms and undue complexities that have crept into the document over the course of 50 years of continual amendments. A five-member independent advisory panel has been appointed to lead the task and report back to the Ontario government with recommendations for reducing regulatory burden, supporting housing production and removing barriers to innovation and interprovincial trade.
That’s all while upholding core objectives to protect health and safety and promote durability, accessibility, energy efficiency and optimal building performance. A newly launched public consultation is seeking input to help guide the advisory panel’s work.
“We are advancing our plan to streamline and right-size the Building Code,” says Robert Flack, Ontario’s Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. “This independent body of industry experts will help identify where requirements can be simplified, consolidated, clarified or modernized. To be clear, requirements that protect health and safety will stay in place, but unnecessary ones will be removed.”
Anecdotally, government insiders have sketched out an ambitious agenda.
“We’ve heard that the goal is to cut the code in half,” John Lane, president of the Ontario Building Officials Association (OBOA) and chief building official for the Town of Caledon, recounted during a recent podcast discussing the planned review.
Joining him in the conversation, Kirstin Jensen, vice president, policy advisory, advocacy and relationships, with the Ontario Home Builders Association (OHBA), concurred that she has frequently heard Flack describe Premier Doug Ford’s and his own surprise when they first saw the code’s heft, which currently fills two large binders in printed form. She characterizes the ensuing call for a line-by-line review as an opportunity to: modernize or remove outdated provisions that stifle innovation; clarify language that spurs inconsistent interpretations; and ensure that requirements are in line with code objectives.
“It’s about effectiveness and useability of the code. We could all benefit from clear, consistent and easy-to-interpret code language,” Jensen maintained. “It’s about whether every provision is still achieving its intended outcome, and in the most effective way possible.”
System-level scrutiny
The Ontario Building Code is a set of regulations under the provincial Building Code Act and, as thus, can be amended through Ministerial decree without need for approval from the legislative assembly. The voluminous document is organized into three divisions — A, B and C — that sequentially encompass the objectives, technical and administrative requirements. Technical requirements in Division B are further categorized into 12 parts, with provisions for low-rise residential, commercial and light industrial buildings of up to three storeys and footprints no greater than 600 square metres (6,400 square feet) amassed within Part 9. As well, the code has a number of appendices containing supplemental information and standards.
A consultation paper posted on the provincial regulatory registry outlines the rationale for the review and the approach to information gathering. The advisory panel has been instructed to take a “system-level perspective” and produce recommendations that: are grounded in credible evidence; practical to implement; and consider potential spinoff implications for construction processes and timelines, supply chains, performance outcomes and component/equipment lifecycles.
The review comes as the provincial government pursues agendas to boost housing affordability, remove barriers to interprovincial trade and labour mobility, and harmonize Ontario’s code with the national model codes to the greatest extent possible. The advisory panel will scrutinize where Ontario’s code diverges from the recently released 2025 model national construction code to assess whether deviations are justified to promote particular provincial priorities or if regulatory burden could be reduced through alignment with the national code.
The advisory panel will also consider whether requirements need to be enshrined in the code or if the same objectives could be achieved via guidance documents, reference standards, administrative or professional practices. That’s to be done through a “public-interest and safety-focused” lens.
The public is invited to provide examples of their experience with elements of the code that they’ve found difficult to interpret, overly prescriptive without a commensurate gain in building performance, outdated and/or unwelcoming to alternative approaches that could deliver equivalent or better results. The consultation paper poses eight broad questions, allowing a range of parties — architects, engineers, construction contractors, developers, municipal building officials and other stakeholders — to respond to those most relevant to their experience, expertise and interests.
“Where possible, respondents should identify the relevant Building Code provision, section, topic or type of requirement, explain how the issue arises in practice, describe who is affected, and indicate whether the issue appears to be recurring or more limited in scope. Examples, evidence, and practical suggestions are greatly appreciated,” the consultation paper instructs.
Facilitating progress
One question specifically addresses energy efficiency to explore whether stakeholders confront barriers to compliance and if they favour adjustments to either enhance or simplify current requirements. In this, energy management specialists maintain that harmonization with the national code’s tiered energy performance framework — four progressive tiers for commercial/institutional buildings and five for smaller Part 9 buildings — would provide consistency for code users and open up more flexibility to deliver the energy savings and peak demand reduction the Ontario government has prioritized.
The Ontario Building Code’s supplemental standard for energy efficiency in large buildings, labelled as SB-10, currently references the 2015 national energy code for buildings (NECB). That’s a 10-year lag behind the 2025 version, which provides tiered tracks for minimum performance and 25 per cent, 50 per cent and 60 per cent improved performance over that base.
“It seems reasonable to harmonize SB-10 with NECB, as most professionals would appreciate consistency between provinces and territories,” notes Andrew Pride, an engineer and energy management consultant specializing in sustainability and strategic conservation planning. “The tiered energy performance framework offers a mechanism for industry players to advance at their own pace in a way that’s predictable and nationally consistent, and it’s one of the simplest ways to reduce the learning curve for all builders and suppliers.”
Outdated or overly prescriptive provisions risk slowing the pace of progress whether there is simply no option to get a product or technique approved for use or the process for doing so is cumbersome, time-consuming and costly. Both those scenarios tend to keep developers, service providers and suppliers married to the status quo.
“When it comes to innovative building materials or construction methods, if the code isn’t keeping up with how those methods roll into industry then it’s not as effective and useable as it should be, and that leads to interpretation problems and discrepancies among builders and building officials,” Jensen observed. “If we can address some of the clarity issues and duplication and outdated provisions, then it’s reducing unnecessary frictions or just general inefficiencies that we find in the code.”
Stakeholder engagement
The advisory panel will draw on responses to the consultation questions and additional engagement with technical experts and other identified parties to inform an interim report to be submitted to the Minister this fall. Although a final report is targeted for March 2027, Jensen speculates more time will be required. (Notably, an Ontario government review of the property tax and assessment system, launched in August 2023, is still in progress.)
“It’s an extensive technical review. It’s going to need lots of stakeholder consultation,” she said. “My understanding is that a lot of groups have been approached.”
From building officials’ perspective, Lane reported there is some trepidation that an overzealous approach to the task could undermine a code that has gained international respect for fostering a safe, healthy and durable built environment.
“Since it was enacted in 1975, Ontario’s building code has been constantly developed and improved to be one of the most advanced construction codes in the world,” he said. “Some might say that the words in the code are written in blood, as most major advancements in the code are the result of major disasters and catastrophes.”
In turn, Jensen reiterated that OHBA’s membership agrees that the code’s fundamental objectives are non-negotiable.
“It’s about getting a better more efficient code, and ways we can find to make that happen while not lessening health and safety and durability of buildings,” she asserted. “I think the real measure of success is whether Ontario ends up with a code that is clearer, easier to administer, easier to comply with, better in line with today’s housing needs, addressing innovative construction materials and methods, and keeping provisions that need to remain because they serve an important purpose.”
Responses to the consultation paper can be submitted until August 14, 2026.
