Electrical Novato

Panels, generators and solar wiring in Novato houses

A panel replaced in the same spot is one of the few electrical jobs Novato hands over instantly: Residential Electrical sits on the express permit list and issues from the permit portal with no plan review, as long as the working clearances of California Electrical Code 110.26 are kept. Relocate the panel, raise the service size or add a standby generator and the job turns into a standard application that the Planning Division reads for decibels.

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  • Rules on this page checked against 15 public sources, October 2026

Asked most

Novato electrical questions, asked before the power goes off

Can a panel replacement in Novato be permitted online?

If nothing moves, yes. Residential Electrical sits on the city's express permit list: a registered contractor applies and pays in Novato Permits and the permit issues straight away, with no plan review and no further approvals. The panel version is held to a like-for-like replacement in the original location that meets the working-space rule in California Electrical Code 110.26 and PG&E's Bulletin TD-7001M-B010. Shifting the panel or raising the service size takes it off the express list and into a standard application.

Do we need a permit for a generator bought for PG&E shutoffs?

It depends which kind. A portable unit is not regulated by the city and needs no building permit, though it still has to respect the noise limits. A permanently mounted generator with a transfer switch does need one, and the Planning Division checks it against the municipal code's noise table for a residential lot. One useful detail from the city's own handout: the noise ordinance is not enforced during an emergency such as a shutoff, and applies again once the power is back.

Who issues the electrical permit for a house in Bel Marin Keys?

Marin County does. The community carries Novato mailing addresses but sits outside city limits, in unincorporated northeastern Marin, so the county handles the permit and the city portal is the wrong door. The Novato Fire Protection District still serves the area, and its inspection list for unincorporated Marin includes a close-in inspection whose purpose is to release the county's hold on the project, a step a house inside city limits does not get.

Amphitheater Park on the former Hamilton Field in Novato
Amphitheater Park on the former Hamilton Field in Novato. Photo: Terrygraham415, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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Free to request, and you agree the scope and price with the person you hire before work starts. In California, a job over $1,000 in labor and materials, or one that needs a building permit, must be done by a contractor licensed by the CSLB in the right class. Ask for the license number and check it at cslb.ca.gov.

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Permits and local rules

Where these requirements are actually written down

  1. What Novato keeps on the permit side

    The Building Division's guide names the electrical work that needs a permit: service panels and subpanels, whether new, replacement, relocated or upgraded; cook tops, ovens and ranges; lighting; a garage door opener that brings new wiring or a new outlet; low-voltage wiring for landscaping and irrigation; pool, spa and hot tub circuits; photovoltaic systems; and the branch circuits feeding air conditioners, space heaters, dishwashers, washing machines, dryers and disposals. The exempt column, drawn from California Building Code Section A105.2, is far shorter than owners expect: changing lamps, connecting approved portable equipment to an existing receptacle, and temporary testing or servicing. Where an emergency forces a replacement first, the application is due by the next working business day.

    Source: City of Novato Building Division (novato.gov)

  2. Decibels, pads and the side property line

    The Planning Division reviews electrical and mechanical equipment, generators and pool pumps among it, under Novato Municipal Code Section 19.22.040 and against the noise table in Section 19.22.070. On a residential lot, equipment permanently installed within 15 feet of a side property line may reach 60 dBA between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. and 45 dBA from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. Above that, mitigation such as an acoustic enclosure or a sound-dampening cover can be required. The handout carves out the obvious case: the noise ordinance is not enforced during an emergency such as a PG&E power shutoff. Keep running after the power returns and the complaint goes to Code Enforcement.

    Source: City of Novato Planning Division (novato.gov)

  3. Solar reviewed by software, inspected by two agencies

    The city's residential solar page sets out both paths. SolarAPP+ runs an automated code-compliance check on most roof-mounted photovoltaic systems, with or without an energy storage system, and the city permit issues instantly, without a full plan set. Three revisions are free inside SolarAPP+, which the city notes it does not match. Inspections are then sequenced rather than combined: the fire district's photovoltaic, battery or combined final is requested first, through its own office, and only after it passes can the building inspection be booked in the city portal.

    Source: City of Novato Building Division (novato.gov)

  4. No grandfather clause for wiring nobody permitted

    Policy 2024-004, effective October 10, 2024, is blunt about work done without a permit. There is no statute of limitations, so nothing becomes lawful by sitting there, and work finished under a previous owner is not grandfathered in. At a sale a buyer, an agent or a lender may require it permitted, corrected and inspected before closing, and otherwise it has to be disclosed; the policy adds that unpermitted work may not be covered by a homeowners policy. There are two ways out: remove it under a demolition permit, or legalize it by permitting what is there and showing it meets code. Code enforcement cases can carry investigative fees.

    Source: City of Novato Building Division, Policy 2024-004 (novato.gov)

State license for this work: C-10 Electrical. Look up a contractor's license on the CSLB website (cslb.ca.gov).

The work

Jobs that start in the portal and end at the meter

  • A panel swapped where it stands

    The express list carries a Residential Electrical permit, and the panel version of it is narrow on purpose: like-for-like, no change of location, and an installation that satisfies the working-space rule in California Electrical Code 110.26 along with PG&E's Bulletin TD-7001M-B010. Stay inside that and a contractor registered with the Building Division pulls the permit online and starts. Step outside it, by shifting the panel to the other end of the garage or raising the service size, and the application goes the standard route instead. The valuation matters either way: the city attaches smoke alarm and carbon monoxide alarm requirements to every permit worth more than a thousand dollars, which a panel job normally clears.

  • A charger circuit in an older garage

    Novato puts branch circuits for appliances squarely on the permit-required side, and a car charger is no different. In a 1970s garage there is usually no spare breaker space and no raceway waiting, so a load calculation comes first and the answer is sometimes a subpanel rather than a bigger service. New construction is the opposite case. Under the CALGreen requirements the city publishes, a new one- or two-family dwelling with an attached garage is built with a listed raceway of at least trade size 1 from the main service or subpanel, panel capacity for a 40-ampere 208/240-volt circuit, a reserved breaker space, and both the raceway end and the circuit directory marked EV CAPABLE.

  • Standby power for a shutoff that runs for days

    PG&E tells this city to expect precautionary shutoffs that last more than a day, and the fix splits in two at the counter. A portable generator is not regulated by the city at all, apart from noise. A permanently mounted generator and its transfer switch need a building permit, and the Planning Division reviews them under the municipal code section on electrical and mechanical equipment: a scaled site plan with dimensions from the unit to the property lines and the structure, the manufacturer's decibel rating, and, where the unit is loud for where it is going, the specification sheet for an acoustic enclosure or a sound-dampening cover.

  • Solar, a battery and two sets of finals

    Roof-mounted solar and storage go through SolarAPP+, the automated review the city takes in place of a full plan set, and it is open only to holders of a B, C-46 or C-10 license; anyone without one of those, an owner-builder included, applies under the standard solar permit type. The approved SolarAPP+ checklist, plan set and specifications are uploaded to the city portal, and a later change has to start back inside SolarAPP+ before a revision request reaches the city. Then the inspection order is fixed and often missed: the Novato Fire Protection District final has to pass before a city building inspection can even be requested.

  • Counter circuits in a kitchen being pulled apart

    The Building Division publishes its own drawing for kitchen receptacles and small appliance circuits, written to the 2025 code cycle, and it is the sheet the inspector will be holding. Two 20-ampere branch circuits have to supply the countertop receptacles. Any counter 12 inches wide or more gets one, and no point along that counter, measured at the wall, may sit more than 24 inches from a receptacle. An island or peninsula either takes an outlet no more than 20 inches above the surface or has provisions left for a future one. Ground-fault protection reaches past the counter as well, into pantries, breakfast rooms and dining rooms.

Electricians inspecting the electrical panels and meters on a multifamily house
Electricians inspecting the electrical panels and meters on a multifamily house. Photo: Tomwsulcer, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The houses here

Three wall types, three ways to reach a circuit

Most of the city filled in during the tract decades, which means stud-framed walls, drywall, and a service and panel sized for a house with one oven and no car to charge. Those are the straightforward ones to add to. Hamilton's first phase, begun in 1932, is the opposite: hollow clay tile and reinforced concrete behind the stucco, with no cavity to fish a cable through, so added circuits usually ride in surface conduit or a furred-out chase. The code list the city adopted by Ordinance 1729 puts the 2025 California Historical Building Code next to the 2025 California Electrical Code, which is the pairing that matters on the base's original buildings. Out at Bel Marin Keys every lot has a back yard on the water, so outdoor receptacles, dock lighting and pump circuits come up far more often there than they do inland.

Part by part

Two Novato addresses where the answer changes

  • Hamilton Field

    The base's original buildings, begun in 1932, are masonry under stucco and stand in a National Register district, so a visible conduit run, a relocated meter or an exterior fixture is a design question as well as a wiring one. Nearly 300 of the old duplexes and houses are still Coast Guard property, which means the work there is set up through that owner rather than the resident.

  • Bel Marin Keys

    The mailing address reads Novato, but the subdivision lies in an unincorporated pocket of northeastern Marin County, so a permit for a new circuit or a panel comes from the county and not from Machin Avenue. Novato Fire still covers it, and its list for unincorporated Marin adds a step a city address never sees: a close-in inspection that releases the county's hold before the work is covered.

Timing

The hours a shutdown has to fit inside

A panel or service change leaves the house dark for part of a day, and the city fixes when that can happen. Authorized construction hours under Section 19.22.070 run 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, with nothing on a Sunday or a federal holiday unless the Community Development Director has authorized it in writing. The inspection calendar is tighter still: the fire district books construction inspections Monday through Thursday, and the Building Division's public counter opens mornings Monday through Thursday, so a solar or battery job that needs both finals has a narrow week to work in.

Before you hire

Questions worth asking before the quote is signed

  • Does this panel really qualify for the express permit, or does moving it a few feet push the job into a standard application?
  • For a generator, can you show the manufacturer's dBA rating and a site plan dimensioned to the side property line before the pad is poured?
  • On solar with a battery, who requests the fire district's final, who requests the city's, and in which order?
  • Does cslb.ca.gov show C-10 Electrical under the business name on the contract, and do you hold the Novato business license the city requires?
  • Will the permit valuation trigger the city's smoke and carbon monoxide alarm requirements, and is that work inside your scope?

Free, no obligation. Next, add your details in the request form.

More questions

Still deciding?

The garage subpanel was never permitted. Does that still matter?

Yes. The Building Division's policy on unpermitted construction states there is no statute of limitations and no grandfather clause, and that work completed under a previous owner is not made lawful by the change of ownership. At a sale a buyer, an agent or a lender can require it permitted, corrected and inspected, and the city warns that unpermitted work may not be covered by a homeowners policy. The two routes are legalizing it or removing it under a demolition permit.

Our garage has a capped raceway marked EV CAPABLE. What is it for?

A future car charger. The CALGreen requirements the city publishes have a new one- or two-family dwelling with an attached garage built with a listed raceway, trade size 1 or larger, running from the main service or subpanel to an enclosure near where a charger would go, plus panel capacity for a 40-ampere 208/240-volt circuit and a reserved breaker space. The raceway end and the panel directory both have to be marked. The rough work is already paid for.

Does being on MCE change who we deal with for a service upgrade?

No. MCE supplies the generation side of the bill, and Novato's path there was not quick: the council voted against joining in February 2009, reversed that in September 2011, and households were enrolled from the middle of 2012 unless they opted out. The poles, the service drop and the meter stayed PG&E's. A service change still means PG&E disconnecting and reconnecting, and the city's own panel criteria point at a PG&E bulletin.

Where these facts come from

Checked against these public sources in October 2026. Rules and programs change: confirm permit requirements with the city before work starts, and a contractor's license on the CSLB website.

  • novato.gov: residential express permits (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 6736 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639166071631400000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: general permit information (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639227258571000000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639166026201330000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639210241902630000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639034841462930000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: 639207669423830000 (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: residential solar (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: public safety power shutoffs (novato.gov)
  • novato.gov: marin clean energy mce (novato.gov)

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