Thursday, March 26, 2026
at The Wild Center
8 am to 5 pm
Join builders, designers, code officials, tradespeople, and material suppliers for a one-day, interactive training on the Adirondack Building Conference: 2025 Energy Conservation Construction Code of New York State (ECCCNYS). Led by industry practitioners, the workshop will highlight key code updates, compliance strategies, and best practices for energy-efficient, climate-aligned residential construction. Participants will gain practical tools to meet New York State’s evolving building requirements while advancing shared goals for housing quality, decarbonization, and workforce capacity across Northern New York. Opportunities to connect with industry vendors.
Continuing Education: (1) AIA LU/HSW, (1) PDH, and (1) GBCI CEU additional credits are pending official approval from DOS; however, we can offer the course as PDE.
REGISTRATION
$25 Student
$50 General Registration
coffee/tea, light breakfast, lunch, reception & drink tickets included
Scholarships are available, please contact Jen Kretser jkretser@wildcenter.org with your request.
Agenda
8 am: Doors open for vendors & coffee hour
9 am: Event begins ; Keynote: Chris Sgroi, Senior Project Manager for Codes & Standards with NYSERDA
9:30 – 11:30 am: Introduction to the Residential 2025 ECCCNYS by Builders for Builders with Kevin Stack, CEO of Building in Nature’s Image
Session Description: This interactive training will guide you through the significant changes to the 2025 ECCCNYS and identify the new provisions and the key revisions from a builder's perspective.
As energy codes continue to evolve, successful compliance requires a clear understanding of code intent, building performance, and the trade-offs inherent in each of the three compliance pathways. This builder-led training introduces the 2025 ECCCNYS through the practical lens of constructability, cost control, building science, and long-term building performance.
Participants will examine key changes from prior code cycles and explore how those changes impact building enclosures, mechanical systems, and verification requirements. Real-world case studies will demonstrate how builders can meet—or exceed—code requirements cost-effectively, while simultaneously improving durability, comfort, resilience, and project management.
Designed for builders, remodelers, trades, and code officials, this session bridges the gap between regulation and real-world construction—supporting better decisions in the field and more consistent, effective code implementation across New York State.
11:30 am – 1 pm: Lunch & Vendor Expo
1 – 2 pm: Code Based Resilience with Josh Stack, Founder & Principal at Stack Resilience LLC
Session Description: This session introduces a builder's framework of using the 2025 NYS Energy and Uniform Code to achieve above code resilience measures for key disturbances including extreme heat, flooding, severe storms, power outages, and other disturbances faced by North Country designers, builders, and building owners. The presentation is based on the presenter's experience developing more stringent local energy and green building codes, code based extreme heat best practices, and passive building and building science based solutions for the residential built environment.
2:15 – 4:15 pm: Significant Changes to 2025 Residential Code of New York State with Arthur Pakatar, The Pakatar Group, LLC
Session Description: This training highlights key updates in the 2025 Residential Code of New York State, focusing on important changes to the Building and Electrical chapters. Designers, builders, and developers will gain practical insight into revised requirements for structural design criteria, fire protection, alarms, stairs and emergency egress, energy storage systems, decks, and guards, as well as new electrical provisions for emergency disconnects, surge protection, and expanded GFCI locations. The course emphasizes what’s new, what’s changed, and what it means for residential project design and construction as the 2025 code takes effect on December 31, 2025.
4:15 – 5 pm: Reception & Networking in the Great Hall
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
KEYNOTE: Chris Sgroi
Senior Project Manager for Codes & Standards - NYSERDA
Kevin Stack
LEED Fellow | LEED Faculty | Builder | Building Scientist | Eco-Literacy Educator
A biologist by training and a builder by practice, Kevin is the founder of Building in Nature’s Image™ — a consultancy and educational platform dedicated to designing and constructing the human-built environment using the laws of life as its guide. His earlier ventures, Northeast Natural Homes and Northeast Green Building Consulting (NGBC), former Certified B-Corps established him as a pioneer in scientific and ecological construction.
Kevin holds the LEED Fellow designation, the highest honor awarded by the U.S. Green Building Council, and also serves as USGBC Faculty. He is a credentialed Biologists at the Design Table (BaDT) — a rigorous designation from the Biomimicry Institute that positions biologists as active collaborators in the design process. Kevin has served on the USGBC National Board of Directors, chaired the LEED for Homes Core Committee, and continues to serve on the Adirondack Research Consortium Board.
Kevin holds a B.S. in Biology from SUNY ESF and a B.S. in Forestry from Syracuse University, both completed concurrently in 1977, giving him a dual scientific literacy in living systems and landscape ecology that few builders possess. In 2014, he returned to graduate school and earned an M.S. in Sustainable Construction Management & Engineering from SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry in association with Syracuse University. His published thesis — “The Origin of Ecological Performance Standards as Applied to the Built Environment” — is a scholarly argument for grounding building performance standards in ecological science rather than engineering convention alone, a question he continues to pursue through practice, teaching, and research. When he is not at a design table or job site, Kevin is likely on a mountain. He is both a winter and regular Adirondack 46er (#8819), and the proud grandfather of 12 aspiring ones.
Josh Stack
Josh works as a residential construction manager and verification/QA consultant on a diversity of passive, healthy and ecologically inspired projects. Educated in biology and law at Cornell, NYU and SUNY UB, in the Peruvian rainforest and on construction sites, he also advises clients in deliberating for our children’s adaptive health and resilience as an adaptive law practitioner on projects of varying complexity and scale. He teaches, internationally, on resilience science, sustainable design & construction and biomimicry.
Art Pakatar
Art Pakatar is a principal of The Pakatar Group, a consulting and training firm focused on residential construction, energy efficiency, and code compliance. He is a New York State–certified Code Enforcement Official and holds ICC credentials as an Energy Code Inspector and Plans Examiner.
With more than a decade of experience delivering technical education, Mr. Pakatar has trained code officials, designers, builders, and developers across the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and throughout the United States. He holds professional certifications from the International Code Council, the Association of Energy Engineers, the Building Performance Institute, PHIUS, and RESNET, and is recognized as a subject matter expert in residential codes and high-performance
building practices.
