Does a furnace repair need a permit in Cupertino?
Usually not, if it is a repair. The Building Division's list of exempt mechanical and gas work includes replacing any minor part that does not alter the equipment's approval or make it unsafe. Replacing the furnace itself needs a mechanical permit before the work starts. The same list exempts portable heaters and portable cooling units, which is why a space heater bought to get through a cold week needs no permit at all.
We live in a fourplex in Cupertino. Can our furnace swap use the instant permit?
No. Cupertino's instant furnace permit is limited to single-family houses and duplexes, with the new furnace in the same location, no air conditioning work and no historic property involved. Anything outside those limits goes through a standard building permit with plan review, so tell the contractor what kind of building you live in before the quote is written.
Does Cupertino require an electric heat pump when the furnace dies?
No. The city's reach code required newly constructed buildings to be all-electric, and even that is no longer enforced: after a Ninth Circuit decision, the City Attorney and the City Manager's office directed the Building Division to suspend enforcement of Chapter 16.32 as of May 15, 2024. For an existing house the limit comes from the Air District, whose zero-NOx standard reaches gas furnaces manufactured after January 1, 2029.
The new registers are close to the bedroom smoke alarm. Does it have to move?
It may. Cupertino's smoke and carbon monoxide self-certification form, written to the 2025 Residential Code, says a smoke alarm must be at least 3 feet horizontally from the supply registers of a forced-air heating or cooling system and outside their direct airflow. When work is valued at more than one thousand dollars, carbon monoxide alarms go on every level and outside each sleeping area, unless the house has no fuel-burning appliance and no attached garage.
Why does the heat pump plan have to show where every unit goes?
Because the city uses it to check two things. The handout says the plan shows that the chosen space can heat the house to at least 68 degrees, measured 3 feet up, under the Residential Code, and the panel size it asks for lets staff judge whether the existing electrical system can carry the new load. The outdoor setbacks on the same plan feed the Sound Rating Worksheet.
