Good-Bye To Gas Kitchen, Hot Water & Heating & Laundry Appliances In NYC

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launderess

launderess

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Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage
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YES!

Progress. It's so dangerous, wasteful, and unnecessary. They never should have allowed residential gas service in the first place. If they had spent money on local gas electric generator facilities, increasing electric availability, and all electric home subsidies, we would have been better off and they wouldn't have had to bury all those gas lines. The likes of which are getting older and rustier by the day. hint-hint.

Electric doesn't need to be buried. Electric doesn't leak out and make a home explode.
 
Future proofing

As horrendous that sounds, that is basically perfectly in line with plans to go carbon neutral by 2050.

Putting a 30 year lifespan between renovations seems reasonable.
Meaning the last gas installations will go out of service by 2051.

And yes, appliance, heating and similar are emitters aswell.
And for that, they are very easily replaceable ones.
Sure not huge, but certainly significant.

The bit of carbon capture we will be seeing will be used up by just plainly harder to decarbonise industries (air travel, certain chemistry processes etc.).

And - even if some will ignore this fact - as long as the total result of all installations will have a COP of 2-2.5 you are improving the footprint.
That is not only easily done with todays technologies but also just with todays electricity emissions averages.
As in with every step closer to getting the emission of the energy sector down, the lower that number gets.

With these things, you can't start regulating them when the goal needs to be reached.

Construction and renovations are the kinds of things that are planned ahead for decades and thus lag behind for decades.

So yeah.
Sucks, but has to be done IMO.
 
Only new construction

If place has gas connections they remain far as one knows.

Not everyone likes electric for cooking/baking in this area, to say nothing our electricity costs are very high.

Only people who have electric dryers in private homes for instance are those who cannot have natural gas for various reasons.

Would never want to heat a home in New York via electricity. Costs are simply too dear.
 
I still fail to understand why these bans are occurring without a low/non emissions facility in place, up and running, with the majority of bugs worked out and more than enough capacity for current and future additions. I don't see any of that taking place yet. Gas is still a better alternative than resistance heating until viable replacement(s) are functional.
 
I heat my home with electric. Very INEXPENSIVE baseboard heaters.
Clean. QUIET. Easy to control. Won't kill me by quietly leaking out. Won't explode. Easy to zone. Virtually maintenance free.

Electric is not only superior, it's already here.
It's been here for quite a while.
Apparently hiding behind a gas industry created wall of false narratives that it's some how "less expensive".

If you live in an area prone to earthquakes you should be particularly wary of having gas pipelines anywhere NEAR your home, much less inside of it. An earthquake can instantly shift the ground and cause a break in a line that will allow unlimited amounts of gas to spill out.

No doubt that's what most of the fires during earthquakes come from. It's bad enough to have one's home thrown about but then to have to deal with it possibly burning down?
 
“No doubt that's what most of the fires during earthquakes come from. “

In 1906 there was more damage to San Francisco from the resulting fires after the quake than from the quake itself.

Our home is all electric and our heaters are Hydronic electric baseboard heaters, NOT resistance heaters, that are controlled by wall thermostats. These heaters are 41 years old and they heat our home way better than the pellet insert ever did and for just about the same amount of money as we spent on the pellets for heating.

During the winter time we had to burn a bag of pellets a day to keep the house warm enough and at the now price of 5.99 to 6.99 a bag plus tax it was no bargain. We still had a PG&E bill on top of the expense of the pellets so it averages about the same using all electric and its a whole lot more convenient, cleaner and better for the environment.

We all have to move with the times and make energy use choices that will save the Earth.

Eddie
 
Low emissions

On the topic why they tackle buildings:

Emissions are emissions, and buildings now are buildings in 30 years.
And according to plan, in 30 years, emissions have to be at 0 basically.

If they are built electric now, they will be as low emissions as the electricity they use.
Thus, starting to make buildings 0 direct emissions now will mean they will become net 0 emissions down the line no matter what.
No future regulatory work needed.

I'm betting on the renovation requirements to come by 2030 the latest.
Refitting a building to be 0 direct emissions is a lot harder than building for those requirements. Thus they have to give a more wide time frame for that.

On the cost argument:

Yes it will be expensive.
US power is obscenely cheap though currently.
While German pricing is a bit to high to compare it to, doubling the rates on electricity wouldn't be to far fetched to finance the switch to renewables.

Having gotten a service below actual cost for to long makes the price correction so much worse and it will hit many US households hard.
Same with gasoline. Same with certain goods.
And same with natural gas.
Thing is that below actual cost here not only means subsidises and artificially held low, but also not including the overall impact beyond just the good.
And yes, if things would have started to be changed 20 years ago that correction would have been far softer for many.
But unfortunately, that didn't happen.

But on the other hand, to be cost effective, the electric (probably heat pump) system would have to reach a COP of about 3.7.
Which is high for an annual average - especially in the cold climate of New York winter - but not unreasonable for a well layed out system.

Here in Germany, replacing gas with a heat pump would require a COP of over 4.7 for financial break even on consumables alone.
That is barely within technical possibility currently.

And well, yes some people prefer gas for cooking.
But it's not that you need gas to cook.
Sure it isn't the same, but it's not a thing that validates changing the goals on climate change on, I think.
 
Again, for now only buildings that are being targets is new

Older buildings do not have to eliminate gas hook-ups by retrofitting.

That does not mean NYC buildings escape this fresh new Hell, they are coping with other mandates.

https://www.urbangreencouncil.org/content/nyc-building-emissions-law-frequently-asked-questions

Thing to remember at least in NYC vast percentage of housing are rentals. Of that nearly 60% or more falls under some sort of state, local or federal regulation. This includes rent regulations, public and subsidized housing, and so forth.

Thus whenever state, city or even federal government order commercial or residential buildings in NYC to do anything, logical course is for owners to pass those costs along to tenants. All sorts of housing cost more here than it ought to due to heavy regulatory environment, price controls and other factors.

First round of telling developers to build apartment housing with lower emissions caused them to install PTAC units in apartments instead of central heating. That was all well and good except low to moderate income tenants (and their supporters) moaned that given NY's high electric rates such households would be at a fiscal disadvantage.

There is no such thing as a free lunch. If one group does not pay their fair share, others have to pick up that end.

Vast amount of those pushing or pushed for this change live in older and most likely rent regulated or public housing. They won't be affected by these changes, but anyone looking for new housing of any sort from single family home to an apartment will be paying more.

Ironically anytime a LL tries to change heating or whatever from current steam or hot water (from oil or gas) it is tenant supports who are first out of gate saying people cannot afford to pay.
 
Just some observations: With induction ranges falling in price, their instant heat control compares to gas and they don't dump hydrocarbons and unneeded heat into a room. Electric water heaters may not recover hot water as quickly as gas, but they do a better job of maintaining a more accurate water temperature than gas, even overnight. Heat pump heating was proven to be a bust early on, still needing emergency expensive electric heat when the outside temp gets too low. Gas for home heating is probably the most reasonably priced in most locations. There once was a time when gas air conditioning was around. I never could figure out how that worked. But, I was the kid that ate the paste in the first grade.
 
I have no idea what the electric rates are in New York or any other state for that matter, but let me assure you the rates in California are no bargain either.

We pay $0.26 per KWH in the tier 1 level and $0.33 per KWH for tier 2 on the non time of use rate. You enter tier 2 level when you've exceeded the baseline level which varies based on the time of year. If you consume over twice the baseline level while you’re in tier 2 you get bumped up to tier 3, which thankfully is territory we’ve never entered. I have no idea what the charge per KWH is for tier 3 and I hope to never find out.

We also pay more for gasoline in California than any other state in the union save maybe Hawaii. While we may not reach the levels of energy costs that our friends in Europe pay, Californians pay more for energy than almost every other area of the USA when you factor in gasoline prices into equation.

The secret for keeping you energy costs down is to be careful how much you use. Limit your driving if you can. Keep the damn windows and doors shut when the heat is on. Turn off lights in rooms not being used, keep your thermostats set lower during the winter. Only use air conditioning when absolutely necessary, don’t waste hot water, the list goes on and on. Basically, you need to use good common sense in how you use energy.

One thing for certain is its NOT gonna get any cheaper than it is right now.

Eddie
 
Ironically, one issue solved but many others created in its place. I may not agree with John Lefever’s views on things at times but I definitely agree with him on how a majority of electricity is lost in transmission from the power plant to your house which results in more pollution being released into the atmosphere vs natural gas being sent to your home.
 
Heat pump heating was proven to be a bust early on

Really? Was it?
So 11% of the EU housing market was build with unusable technology?

Yes, heat pump heating can default to the very dear back up resistive heat.
And that can pull you COP down heavily.

Thing is that modern systems can operate with a COP of 4 or higher in most of the heating weather.

As I calculated, yes, that means you probably will pay more currently.
But even in the coldest parts of Germany, you easily can get over the required 2.5 to make environmental sense.

Further, in the past, building technology just wasn't there for efficient heat pump heating.

Retrofitting a heat pump to an existing building is a lot more demanding.

As we are talking new building, specing insulation and similar to those standards does a whole lot.

And again, yes, it will be expensive.
The upcoming 30 years will be expensive
in any regard period.

There just isn't much of a choice, is there?
 
Energy losses

As stated by me many times, the golden number is 2.5.

Gas power plants are roughly between 40% and 60% efficient.

The US EIA estimates transmission losses of 5% in total.

Thus, assuming an average efficiency of gas power plants of 50%, 0,95*0,5=0,475.

So, for every 1000kWh of gas burned, 475kWh of electricity land at your house.
47,5% efficient.

So, to get to break even, you need to turn 1kWh of electricity into just over 2.1kWh of usable thermal energy.
Or in other words a COP of 2.1.

Even worst case, a gas power plant has 40% efficiency. That would actually be below what is generally stated in literature.

Doubling the transmission losses, you'd have to get a COP just under 2.8.

Both of these numbers are easily reached in a correctly specd building - even with the need for back up heat.

A COP equivalent of 2.1 could be reached in a decently designed and rather fast heat pump dryer aswell.

Any total COP averaged over all buildings above 2.5 will reduce the carbon footprint compared to natural gas heating.

Addendum:

As someone will bring up electric cars aswell, here are the numbers for that.

According to the EPA, an average passenger vehicle emitts 404g of CO2 per mile.

According to the EIA, the average kWh in the US emitts 386g of CO2.

Thus, an electric car could use up to just about 1kWh per mile to be CO2 equivalent to any ICE car.

However, the average electric car uses just over 1/3rd of a kWh per mile.
Even with charging losses, transmission losses etc, you are still just about cutting your CO2 emissions in half that way.
 
Even at 20%

Again, assuming a way to low gas power plant efficiency of 40%:

0,4*0,8=0,32

So just about a third. Thus requiring a COP of 3.

In this totally unrealistic scenario.

Or:

Burning natural gas produces about 220g of CO2 per kWh.

The average US kWh produces 386g of CO2.
Interpolating the (way to high) transmission losses of 20%:
386g = 80%
Thus 100% equals 1.25*386g=483g just about.

This brings you to an COP of 483/220=2.2.
 

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