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Bay Area plan to ban natural gas
- newyankee 4y agoGiven that heat pumps and other technologies have proven themselves quite well at this point it is not a bad idea for SF to lead the country on this one and shows that one can electrify most stuff (if not all stuff)
- akg_67 4y agoYep, until the next earthquake or forest fire or another natural disaster happens and your power goes out. Then you are out of luck to cook, and/or warm yourself. Relying on one type of energy source is a single point of failure.
- jlkjawl 4y ago[dead]
- danans 4y agoGood luck getting natural gas service after an earthquake severe enough to knock out power. Natural gas lines are far more at risk of breaking during such an event, and the gas utility will usually shut off gas supply until they are sure there aren't major leaks. After an earthquake, you are supposed to shut off your own supply at your meter with a gas wrench.
- ramenmeal 4y agoWe had gas service after the 6.4 in northern california in December, but power was out.
- danans 4y agoThey don't call these things "Earthquake Survival Tool" for no reason: https://www.amazon.com/Ready-America-3333-Earthquake-Emergency/dp/B000BQKLWK https://www.amazon.com/Ready-America-3333-Earthquake-Emergen...
- akg_67 4y agoI live in an earthquake prone place and gas canisters, that is what we have with a single burner portable stove for emergency. We had a 6.7 earthquake 4 years ago, power and water went out for 3 days. Our emergency kit that included bottled water and portable stove with gas canister what helped us. I can't imagine right now experiencing such an event when temperatures are -13C.
- adrianN 4y agoDoes California want to ban camping stoves?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- jliptzin 4y ago[flagged]
- notinfuriated 4y ago[flagged]
- dang 4y agoPosting like that will get you banned here, regardless of how wrong someone is or you feel they are. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
- notinfuriated 4y agoAnd you didn't bother posting a comment like this in response to the guy bringing up Fox News. My comment was exactly correct. Here I am getting threatened with a ban after posting a second, angrier comment in response to the first getting flagged almost immediately. You've set up a community here that feels free to post lawyerly, I'm-not-hitting-you level bullshit comments where people attempt to troll the discussion and get nothing remotely close to a penalty. That dude probably even got actual upvotes, so he can continue to be a little dickhead with his occasional "durrr fox news" comments and use his downvote privileges on this site.
- notinfuriated 4y agoAlso reminds me of this thread where I get another ban threat: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34016817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34016817 Meanwhile you basically allow someone to call me gay and let that slide without any threat of a ban: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34014963 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34014963 This site should probably burn. Fuck your moderation, go ahead and ban me, I'm changing my password to something I'll never remember anyway.
- 4y ago
- jjtheblunt 4y agoI can’t think of a way to electrify launching a payload into orbit, but who knows what the future might think up.
- triceratops 4y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator
- adrianN 4y agoYou make fuel from atmospheric carbon dioxide, water, and electricity. Like you would on Mars.
- bluSCALE4 4y agoI hate my heat pump. Load as hell, makes the basement freezing in the winter, 50 gallon is really 45 gallon, time to reheat sucks, doesn't pair well with recirculating pumps, electric usage is more expensive than gas. Basically, get a size up compared to whatever you used for gas and you'll be good.
- conk 4y agoThis is the opposite of my existence. I love my rheem heat pump water heater. Costs me less than old gas water heater. I heat to 140 and use a mixing valve to have safe temp at 120. I’ve never run out of hot water.
- YeBanKo 4y agoI think experience varies greatly by region. I wonder what regions you and op are.
- YeBanKo 4y agoInstalling anything new in the bay is cost prohibitive. Qualified labour shortage as well, an example is when contractors that installed solar panels damaged roof pretty badly, like making see through holes and sloppy job around mounting brackets, just painful to watch. Also, last 2 years we had rolling outages, so I am actually not sure if the grid will fare well with the increased load. Insulation can greatly increase heating efficiency, and should be the first step when installing a heat pump anyway. Years ago when I signed up for pge i chose community aggregates renewable energy source instead of buying from pge. Couple years ago it was more expensive to buy renewable + delivery charges then just buying from pge, even though pge had at least half of it coming from gas and coal. Yet renewable should be much cheaper. So i suspect right now cost of heat pump heating isn’t gonna be cheaper than gas, given upfront cost. Utilities can’t achieve renewable efficiency and maintain grid, yet its ok to push it on everyone else. Heat pump however makes total sense if you have solar panel and battery. But again, upfront cost.
- readthenotes1 4y agoas long as the insanity doesn't come to my city, I fully agree with you. What was that "n-gate" phrase "a city at war with it's citizens"?
- dzhiurgis 4y agowhat happened to n-gate by the way??
- readthenotes1 4y agoI wish i knew. I miss their take on the forum.
- CyberDildonics 4y agoHope their electricity isn't being generated with natural gas
- noahtallen 4y agoThis code would be about home appliances. But it turns out that massive generators are pretty efficient since they can operate at a huge scale. So even if the electricity replacing the gas stove was generated with gas, it'd still be better for the environment (and human health)
- Thorrez 4y agoHow does the efficiency of * natural gas -> fire -> heat -> electricity in massive generator -> home -> induction stove -> pan compare to * natural gas -> fire -> heat -> pan ? And resistive is worse than induction.
- photonbucket 4y agoI don't know if it's significant, but there is also energy to physically move the gas to your location, for the second scenario
- thomas_ma 4y agoEnergy efficiency is going to be better with induction in that scenario since it only heats the food, not the pan, stovetop, etc. On top of that, the pollution is dramatically reduced. A modern natural gas turbine at a power plant is dramatically cleaner burning than an open flame in a kitchen stove.
- nwiswell 4y ago> On top of that, the pollution is dramatically reduced. A modern natural gas turbine at a power plant is dramatically cleaner burning than an open flame in a kitchen stove. Not to mention the pollution from the power plant is not going directly into your home (or face). This is not a small or hypothetical impact. From the article: > The air district estimated that the new rules for homes would cut nitrogen oxides enough to prevent 89 deaths per year in the Bay Area.
- acquirecorn 4y ago[flagged]
- BoorishBears 4y agoWhy are people so attached to gas stoves when we have induction anyways? I love to cook and have a gas stove, but I bought my parents an induction unit a while back. Sure it can't provide an open flame, but the ludicrous speed at which it heats things up vastly outweighs that drawback. And not having to worry about ventilation nearly as much as just a bonus. My range hood needs to be on full tilt when I cook over long periods of time or the air gets "stuffy"
- metalforever 4y agoElectric is old and the Bay Area is shitty about approving building permits
- Baeocystin 4y agoBecause cooking with gas provides more, and better, temperature control than even very expensive induction setups. If you stir fry, there is no comparison. Also, low temp induction sucks. Even good units do low-frequency PWM to approximate low heat settings that come naturally with gas. Induction is a big step forward compared to the older, resistive-style electric elements, and there's a lot to like about it. But what it isn't, is a good replacement for gas, at least as it currently stands.
- rgmerk 4y agoHaven’t tried stir frying yet (and I’ve read claims that any home and even restaurant wok burner can’t match the flavour from the very high-power outdoor gas burners used on the streets of Asia) but low temp induction works just fine, thanks. My $50 Ikea hotplate does a better job at very low heat than our gas burners, on-off cycling and all. Indeed, if you’re keen, you can buy specialist induction hotplates with connected thermometer probes that can give you way more precise control than gas ever could. Pricey but if you’re into fancy stuff like tempering chocolate they are excellent.
- Baeocystin 4y agoWok cooking at home doesn't require anything crazy, just a wok ring/burner setup, like millions of folks already have. A rough BTU breakdown for familiar comparison is ~7-10k BTU max for an average American home-cooking gas cooktop, ~15-20k BTU for an average Chinese one. Restaurants are in the 100k+ category because of volume as much as anything. Speaking from personal preference, A ~50-75k BTU burner/ring setup is just fine; I don't need to cook larger volumes. When doing single-serving-sized batches, the indoor 20k is ok, too. Now, can I cook in general using electric? Of course. Can I cook and achieve the flavors and composition I want with it? Not entirely, and yes, that matters to me. Outside of BTU discussions, I toast a lot of veggies over an open flame to get that nice, flavorful char. You can also dry heat them on a comal or the like, but it isn't the same. [edit] FWIW, I would still love to try one of the commercial, 3-phase induction woks some day.
- nilsbunger 4y agoBanning natural gas in new construction seems reasonable and also the biggest win since you don’t have to run pipes to the building. But existing homes? They definitely need to first figure out the objections in the article: * supply chain capacity * cost - we would need subsidies for less affluent people * time to having heat or hot water again after my furnace / water heater breaks and I’m forced into an emergency switch to electric
- jlkjawl 4y ago[dead]
- aag 4y agoMy house is already maxed out on electric capacity because I have an electric car. I've investigated increasing the current coming into the house, but changes in code mean that making that upgrade would cost $20K. So if my hot water breaks, it will cost me $20K+ to fix it. That's not reasonable.
- photonbucket 4y agoIt'd be quite a talking point if this forced you to get an ICE car again
- jlkjawl 4y agoDon't forget the government wants to drain your car battery each night to deal with all the new load this is going to generate. :)
- AdamJacobMuller 4y agoI'm not remotely in favor of this kind of forced conversion described in the article, but, if you actually want to install electric appliances (stove/heater) you can actually do so relatively cheaply without a service upgrade. Basically need to consider that while all of your combined appliances may use far more than your service can supply, they will rarely to never need to all run at the same time. You can interlock appliances and give them some priority so that, for example, when your electric range is on your other power hungry appliances can not be. You wouldn't actually notice or care about this in reality since in a 24h period everything in your home will receive more than ample power just spread out over a longer period of time. The only downside is that not many electricians are capable or willing to install or service a system like this. I'm sure that pool will grow and I'm quite sure that in the future this kind of demand-side management is going to be effectively mandated and I don't see that as a good thing.
- reissbaker 4y agoMany jurisdictions in CA have made what you're describing illegal. E.g. in Berkeley, where I live, I'd need enough service for everything to run at the same time to make it past the permitting and inspections folks.
- sbmyft 4y agoForce everyone to single source of energy. Control that source of energy and weaponize it to control the masses.
- adrianN 4y agoYou mean like fossil fuels? Being off-grid has never been easier since we made great progress on electrifying everything.
- nullc 4y agoAmong other things the utilities proposed for NEM 3.0 that it be made unlawful to generate electricity off grid and not sell it to the utility at wholesale rates (which they would then sell back to you at retail rates). I believe that proposal is dead this time but they're not going to stop trying. Several long term trends are challenging the viability of a public electrical grid, among them the low cost of solar.
- YeBanKo 4y agoNEM 3.0 approval process seemed corrupt. Basically PGE makes sure they have not competition.
- learnreceive 4y ago[flagged]
- bcrosby95 4y ago> The air district estimated that the new rules for homes would cut nitrogen oxides enough to prevent 89 deaths per year in the Bay Area. A unit that does ducted heating and AC is around $13k installed. And the water heater is probably around $4k installed if you include electrical (which you're gonna have to if you have gas). So you're looking at forcing about 2 million houses to spend $17k to save 89 people per year. That's $34 billion. 89 people a year. The state would be bankrupt if they had these safety standards anywhere else, but when it's other people's money, who gives a fuck.
- adrianN 4y agoIt saves 89 people from NOx-related deaths. It is also a necessary step to reach carbon neutrality, which will save more lives.
- reissbaker 4y agoDo you think that $34 billion could save, say, more than 89 people if spent on a more effective plan?
- adrianN 4y agoSure, you could spend the money to build renewables and electrify some developing nation. But it would be a hard political sale to ask two million Californians to spend a couple thousand dollars to help people in Africa or wherever.
- apple4ever 4y agoToo often people forget to make this type of calculation. I get it - it sucks to have to make that type of choice! But in a world with limited resources - of which the cost is just an indirect indication of - we have to. We need to better understand the downsides and alternatives of proposed, not just the upsides. We need to not call people who point them out "killers who hate the environment" and instead listen and work together toward the best solution possible, not the one that sounds the best without understand the details.
- 4y ago
- dehrmann 4y ago> The rules would not apply to gas stoves. I assumed furnaces and water heaters are better ventilated, so this surprised me. Yes, those two emit more nitrogen oxides, but we should be more worried about them indoors than out.
- duskwuff 4y agoThey are. But people get much more defensive about their gas stoves, so here we are.
- YeBanKo 4y agoNope, the media makes seem like people are backwards and get uppity up the gas stove. Gas stove is the cheapest and easier to replace. Induction stove are actually quite nice and typically don’t require much of a retrofit.
- TylerE 4y agoRun time? Like, if it’s half as bad but runs 10x as much…
- nullc 4y agoGas cooking has an extremely low duty cycle, its an emissions rounding error. Cooking is a major source of indoor air pollution but not due to using gas but due to the polution from cooking itself.
- conk 4y agoOnce furnace and water heaters are electric I really don’t see how maintaining gas infrastructure stays economic for PG&E. I guess they can keep raising minimum monthly charges so you’ll end up paying even if you use no gas.
- fwlr 4y ago> The rules would essentially require all new residential construction to have electric water heaters by 2027 and heat pumps instead of furnaces by 2029. Not to be overly snide, but does the Bay Area even do any “new residential construction”?
- Zhenya 4y agoKnock down and rebuild.
- AlbertCory 4y agoactually, this probably isn't what you had in mind, but there are quite a few single story houses that are torn down and replaced with McMansions.
- jhatax 4y agoAs a Bay Area resident with no gas connection, here are points to ponder: 1) PG&E electricity costs are among the highest in the country per KWH. They have received approvals to increase these astronomical costs by 10% in the near future. Gas is cheaper, by a lot. 2) Any time we have winds or hot weather or cold weather, the grid is under pressure and we are asked to curb our electricity usage. 3) In the winter and summer, our monthly bill for a home of 2 with the thermostats set to 63 in the winter and 79 in the summer is $300+. Someone else’s mileage and bills might be different. But 62 is cold in the winter. 79 is hot in the summer. Sometimes unbearably so. If the Bay Area wants to go this route, PG&E needs to be reined in, SIGNIFICANTLY. Bills are borderline unaffordable right now; the future isn’t any cheaper.
- jhatax 4y agoBefore someone chimes in with the obvious suggestions: a) Water heater is a heat pump set to high efficiency. b) Construction is 2016, so relatively new. c) We have done a lot to insulate the home. Net-net, this is an electricity cost issue; we are paying $0.42/KWH on average. This despite having some solar. This is not a profligate usage issue.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- danans 4y agoIf you don't have gas service, how do you do space heating? Resistive electric? If so that could be very expensive. Also, insulation only deals with radiative heat losses and gains, not those causes by air leakage and conduction. High air leakage is quite possible for a 2016 house (especially in California where a lot of production built housing has been of poor quality). > Net-net, this is an electricity cost issue; we are paying $0.42/KWH on average The current time of use peak summer rate is $0.42/kWh. The winter off peak is $0.30/kWh. The only way you can be paying an average of $0.42 is if all your consumption for the year is between 4pm and 9pm during the summer, which is impossible.
- 4y ago
- RyanShook 4y agoNIST study suggests that gas is the most eco-friendly home energy option. Source: https://www.earth.com/news/gas-electric-eco-friendly-home/ https://www.earth.com/news/gas-electric-eco-friendly-home/
- adrianN 4y agoFrom your source: „According to Kneifel, however, electric may become the better bargain and the more environmentally responsible option in the near future.“
- desuforever 4y ago[dead]
- gotoeleven 4y agoWait I've been assured that is disinformation to suggest that democrats were trying to ban gas stoves. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/11/climate/gas-stoves-biden-administration.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/11/climate/gas-stoves-biden-... If national democrats ever said to california democrats "no that is too crazy" there might be an argument here but instead what they say is "shh don't talk about that now we'll do it later"