The US Department of Energy Zero Energy Ready Home Program recognizes that many of our builder and rater partners are faced with major changes to their business operations. As a result, the Zero Energy Ready Home program has developed several policies and temporary allowances related to COVID-19.

Temporary Allowance for Remote Visual Verification for ZERH Certifications - September 2020- Expired

To support our partners and the overall growth of the Zero Energy Ready Home market, the ZERH program is aligning with RESNET to extend the Temporary Allowance for Remote Visual Verifications to as long as RESNET’s policy allowance remains in effect.  

COVID-19  Hardship Relief Policy for Onsite Diagnostics and Testing - April 2020- Expired

The DOE Zero Energy Ready Home team will consider case‐by‐case hardship relief requests related to the use RESNET’s COVID‐19 Pandemic Exception for Onsite Airtightness Tests. In some cases, the DOE ZERH program will allow the use of defaults for testing, per the RESNET temporary policy, such as blower door and duct blaster tests, when a hardship is demonstrated by the builder and/or rater.  These hardships must be related to limits due to COVID‐19 challenges.