Albuquerque swamp cooler permits, licenses, rebates, and water rules

Replacing or converting an evaporative cooler in Albuquerque touches four separate rulebooks: city permits, state contractor licensing, utility rebates, and the Uniform Housing Code. This page pulls all four together with sources, because the answers are genuinely different depending on whether you are inside city limits, in unincorporated Bernalillo County, or out in the East Mountains, and because there is a live PNM rebate most homeowners here do not know exists.

City of Albuquerque permits

The City’s Building Safety Division, inside the Planning Department, runs building, electrical, and plumbing and mechanical permits. Its published list puts a cooler squarely in two of them.

Plumbing and mechanical permit is required for heating or cooling work, for the installation of equipment or ductwork, and for the installation or alteration of a water service outside the structure. The City adds a parenthetical to the equipment and ductwork line that matters: that work can only be completed by a licensed contractor. A roof cooler replacement is equipment and ductwork.

Electrical permit is required for the installation of an appliance, device, equipment, or wiring, and for additions, alterations, or replacements of existing appliances, devices, wiring, or equipment. A cooler swap that reuses the existing circuit and disconnect may not trip that, but a new circuit, a relocated disconnect, or any conversion work does.

Two City rules are worth knowing before you plan a weekend project. First, a homeowner may be issued an electrical or plumbing permit only after passing a written exam with a score of 75 percent or better; the exam is four hours, there are two attempts allowed with a 30 day wait between them, and only one passing exam per year. Second, and more decisively for landlords: for all homes leased or rented to others, a licensed contractor is required to obtain the permit for work performed. There is no homeowner-permit path on a rental.

Fees are set by the City. If your home is in an HOA subdivision, the City notes that plans should be approved by the association first, because the City does not enforce HOA rules.

Outside city limits

The South Valley, much of the North Valley, Los Ranchos, Tijeras, and Edgewood are not the City of Albuquerque, and the City’s permit counter is not the right counter for them. New Mexico’s rules define the term: under 14.5.1 NMAC an “authority having jurisdiction” is the state, or a municipality, county, or other political subdivision that runs a full-service building department with a full-time certified building official and has permitting, inspection, and enforcement authority over the general construction, electrical, and mechanical and plumbing trades. Where a local body meets that definition, it permits and inspects. Where it does not, the state’s Construction Industries Division does. In practice, check which office covers your address before scheduling, and ask who files the permit.

New Mexico license classifications

Cooler work is licensed by the Construction Industries Division of the Regulation and Licensing Department, and the classifications are set out in 14.6.6 NMAC. The ones that matter here:

MM-3 is the one to ask for, because the rule text names evaporative cooling units explicitly. On the labor side, a journeyman refrigeration certificate (JR) and a journeyman sheet metal certificate (JSM) both work under an MM-3 or MM-98 license. A full cooler-to-refrigerated-air conversion is usually a multi-license job: mechanical for the equipment and duct, electrical for the service and circuits, and gas if the furnace changes. Ask every bidder for a license number and verify it with the state. That check applies to us as much as to anyone else.

PNM rebates: up to $400, and most people miss it

PNM runs evaporative cooling rebates for residential customers, and they are real money on a job you were already going to do.

• Up to $400 on a large advanced evaporative air conditioner: a down-draft or side-draft unit with 12 inch rigid media. PNM states plainly that some units are available with 8 inch media and those do not qualify. There is a published list of qualifying models, and PNM requires the model number to match the list exactly up to the asterisk.
• Up to $200 on an advanced window or wall-mounted evaporative unit with rigid media, again against a published qualifying model list.
• A free air conditioner tune-up on an existing refrigerated air system, through PNM’s authorized contractor list.
• Home Energy Checkup Program rebates if you are upgrading an existing refrigerated system to a more efficient model.

The terms as published on the program page updated July 23, 2026: first-come, first-served while funds last, rebates good for purchases made January 1 through December 31, 2026, the rebate cannot exceed the purchase price excluding tax, shipping, and installation, and there is a limit of two rebates per PNM residential electric account. Landlords have a separate waiver form. Qualifying brands on the current large-unit list include AeroCool Pro, Pro-V, and Trophy series from Phoenix Manufacturing, Champion Elite and Champion MasterCool from Essick Air, Breezair and Convair from Seeley, and Premium from Symphony. The MasterCool and Champion, Essick, and AeroCool pages cover what those units actually are.

One caveat that catches East Mountain customers: PNM’s listed New Mexico service territory covers Greater Albuquerque, Rio Rancho, Los Lunas, Belen, and Santa Fe among others. Much of the Estancia Valley is served by Central New Mexico Electric Cooperative instead, which runs its own member rebate program. Check the name on your bill before you count on the $400.

The Water Authority: no cooler rebate, but real water rules

The Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority does not rebate evaporative coolers. Its published rebate list is water efficient washing machines, tree rebates, rainwater harvesting, xeriscape, irrigation efficiency, and a customized performance rebate. If a contractor tells you the Water Authority will pay for your cooler, they are wrong.

What the Water Authority does have is a water waste ordinance that a failing cooler can violate. Water waste is defined as any water, other than natural precipitation, that flows or sprays into a public right-of-way, a municipal storm drain, or adjacent private property. Reports come in through an online form, and the Authority states that all property owners receive at least one warning notice and an opportunity to correct the problem before a fine. A float valve stuck open pouring off a roof into the street is exactly the scenario. There is also a separate equipment malfunction reporting process for genuine breakdowns.

The Authority is also the best source on why coolers here fail the way they do. Its drinking water FAQ explains that the system has blended treated surface water and groundwater from both sides of the river since December 2008, that hardness ranges from moderately hard to hard depending on your distribution zone, that you convert parts per million to grains per gallon by dividing by 17.1, and, in its own words, that when water evaporates the dissolved minerals are left behind and are the residue that collects on evaporative coolers during the summer months. There are 20 distribution zones with published water quality results, so your zone is knowable. Third-party compilations of the 2024 zone reports put the system average near 141 milligrams per liter, about 8.2 grains per gallon, with zones ranging from 45 to 243.

The O-59 cooling ordinance, and what it actually says

This one gets misquoted constantly, so here is the record. Council Bill O-24-59, sponsored by Councilor Fiebelkorn, passed on December 16, 2024 and was enacted January 2, 2025 as O-2024-047, amending Section 14-3-3-2 of the Uniform Housing Code in the Revised Ordinances of Albuquerque.

The bill as introduced would have required cooling facilities capable of maintaining 80 degrees or lower at a point three feet above the floor in all habitable rooms. That temperature standard was removed on the floor. Floor Amendment 1, which passed 6 to 3, struck it and replaced it with a definition-based rule. The enacted subsection requires that every dwelling unit be provided with cooling facilities, and it defines acceptable cooling facilities as fixtures permanently attached to the unit, including but not limited to evaporative “swamp” coolers, central air conditioning, heat pumps, radiant cooling, window units, and mini-splits. Non-acceptable facilities are temporary or portable devices: fans, mobile evaporative coolers, portable air conditioners, ceiling fans, and ventilation systems, which may only be used as a sole source of cooling on a temporary basis while the permanent acceptable facility is being repaired or replaced. A separate floor amendment that would have limited the language to residential rental properties failed 2 to 7.

Two consequences for cooler owners. First, a working evaporative cooler is expressly an acceptable permanent cooling facility under city code; nobody has to convert to refrigerated air to comply. Second, a dead cooler in a rental in July is a housing code matter, and a window fan does not cover you for longer than the repair takes.

There was a second round in 2026. Council Bill O-26-22 as introduced would have added a cooling performance standard: when the outdoor temperature is 85 degrees or higher, the permanent cooling system must be capable of maintaining an indoor temperature at least 15 degrees below the outdoor temperature. A floor amendment stripped that standard out before the Council passed the bill 5 to 4 in April 2026, the mayor vetoed the amended bill, and on May 4, 2026 the Council fell one vote short of overriding the veto, so neither version is law. If someone quotes you a temperature requirement in Albuquerque, that is the bill they are thinking of, and it did not survive.

Sources

• City of Albuquerque Planning Department, Building Safety Division, Permits: cabq.gov/planning/building-safety-division/permits
• 14.6.6 NMAC, Construction Industries Division, Classifications and Scopes; 14.5.1 NMAC, General Provisions (definition of authority having jurisdiction)
• PNM Cooling Rebates program page and qualifying model lists: pnm.com/coolrebate
• Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority, Conservation and Rebates, Water Waste, and Your Drinking Water FAQ pages: abcwua.org
• City of Albuquerque Council legislative records for O-24-59 (enactment O-2024-047), its December 16, 2024 floor amendments, and O-26-22 with executive communication EC-26-145

If you want any of this applied to your address rather than read in the abstract, send a photo of the cooler and the address. Prices are on the pricing page, and the conversion page covers the multi-permit version of the question.