John:
I am not disagreeing with you.
I am, however, *encouraging* you and everyone else to make more helpful and productive statements in the future.
I remember when Steve (Toggleswitch) would talk at length about how electric drying was bad and gas drying was good. He and I had a few conversations and it became clear to him that all his notions about how electricity is generated were not only antiquated, they were very localized. His info, for example, was that every Kwh of electricity needed at least 3 to 4 Kwh of energy (gas, coal etc) to be generated. Newer generators are using less than 2X the gas, and the plants that use the exhaust heat and tilt the equation even further are now common.
We, here in the Northeast part of US tend to think everybody else shares the same infrastructure. It should be clear we don't just by observing the price structure of utilities.
There are plenty of places in US where the cost of electricity is *much* lower than around here because the power is not coming from any thermoelectric power plants, but, for example, from hydroelectric power plants.
Also, please keep in mind that as far as I am aware, there are *no* natural gas infrastructure burning gas in engines to pump the gas (that would in any case be just about as inefficient, given that the problem is that regular internal combustion engines are usually less than 30% efficient) -- they are *all* powered by electric motors. That part is essentially invisible to customers, all they see is that they have a hookup from their homes to the electric and gas utilities, and usually we only care, as customers, about how much things cost us to run. Someone is generating electricity to run very powerful pumps to send natural gas our way.
Natural gas also leaks from old infrastructure, some cities are worse at keeping up with maintenance than others. Natural gas that leaks poses risks to plants nearby, and even though most of the time it doesn't ignite and causes problems (although some buildings around the Boston area have exploded in the last 25 years due to NG leaks from the utilities thru the soil into the buildings' basements), methane (Natural Gas) is *also* a problem that increases global warming thru the Greenhouse Effect.
If we consider the *entire* system, and we should, we should avoid sentences like "it's always better to use a gas dryer" because there are times when an electric dryer will be causing less pollution and less environmental damage.
Cheers,
-- Paulo.