Building Code (2015)

The aim of this Code is to promote sustainable development and to ensure the safety, purposeful functionality and usability of the built environment. This Code applies to construction works, their design, building, use and maintenance insofar as this is not governed by other Acts, ratified international treaties or EU legislation. This Code also applies in the territorial sea and the exclusive economic zone. This Code does not apply to building work that is carried out forthwith due to an unavoidable and urgent need arising in connection with a rescue event, with countering and eliminating a threat and with alleviating the consequences of a rescue event. Construction works, building work and the use of construction works must be as environmentally sound as possible; this principle also includes the requirement of sparing use of natural resources in the course of building work. The Code, among others, provides for energy performance of buildings; protection zone of construction works; protection zone of public water supply and sewerage systems; construction works in public water bodies; construction works that serve national defence purposes, construction works of security authorities and infrastructure at the national border; and drilled wells, boreholes and dug wells.
The Code provides that the protection zone of a construction work is the land underneath and around the construction work within which the owner of the registered immovable is obligated to tolerate the presence of a construction work belonging to another and within which the use of the registered immovable and operations on the registered immovable are restricted for the purposes of safety and of ensuring the functionality of the construction work. In the protection zone, it is prohibited to endanger the construction work or any use of the construction work that follows established procedure; to build another construction work subject to building permit requirement, including the removal or heaping of soil; to obstruct access to the construction work; to obstruct maintenance of the construction work, including the installation of signs to alert the observer to the location of the construction work that has a protection zone or to the danger posed by such construction work; to obstruct the preservation of the plant life or soil within the protection zone in a condition that does not endanger the construction work; and to pursue any other activities provided by law. In the protection zone of a public water supply and sewerage system, it is prohibited to store materials and carry out any blasting, drilling, excavation, pile ramming, mineral resource extraction, land raising, flooding or land drainage operations, and, near construction works, also any lifting operations; near a construction work of the public water supply and sewerage system that is located in a water body, perform any dredging operations or remove soil, dispose of solid substances, anchor water craft, or drag anchors, chains, logs, trawls or nets. Performing topsoil work is also prohibited in the protection zone of electrical installations and the protection zone of communication installations.