Palatine, IL Building Safety: Electrical Permits (2026)

Section 8-30 of the Palatine Village Code adopts NFPA 70, the National Electrical Code, 2020 edition, with a set of local amendments. Section 300.1 is amended so that any conductor carrying 50 volts or more inside a structure must run in rigid heavy-wall galvanized steel conduit, intermediate metallic conduit, or electrical metallic tubing, and any conduit installed outside a building or exposed to weather or buried in earth must likewise be rigid heavy-wall galvanized steel conduit, subject to narrow exceptions such as nonmetallic conduit below a slab.

The village also amends Section 310.106(B) to require copper conductors for residential and commercial branch circuits, feeders and service entrance conductors, with an exception allowing AA-8000 series compressed aluminum wire, sized number 2 or larger, for nonresidential commercial feeders only. Garage wiring gets its own amendment to Section 210-52(g): a duplex receptacle is required in the garage ceiling for an automatic garage door opener, and detached garages need a three-way switch controlling a light at the service door. On the permitting side, Section 8-22(6) lists a residential electric service revision, including generators, among the flat-fee express permit types available to individual residential unit owners, alongside fence, shed and driveway permits, so a homeowner upgrading a panel or adding a generator applies through that same express-permit schedule rather than a full plan review.