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Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

sfchronicle.com

11–20 of 109 posts

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#11

Why 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 lon…

The only real advantage is for woks, for that you need a special induction burner and wok.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#12

Given 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)

Yep, 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.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#13

Hope their electricity isn't being generated with natural gas

This is about residential usages, not power generation, and after the San Bruno explosion killed eight people, I can see where they're coming from.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Bruno_pipeline_explosion

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#14

Why 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 lon…

> Why are people so attached to gas stoves when we have induction anyways?

People are attached to gas stoves because the usual alternative you see in rented units is shitty electric stoves bought at the lowest cost, not induction.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#16

Given 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)

I can’t think of a way to electrify launching a payload into orbit, but who knows what the future might think up.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#18

Why 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 lon…

Personally, I like cooking over gas because it gives me a level of nostalgia for cooking over open flame - when we were kids we had a wood combustion stove, and spent a lot of time camping in the bush cooking over open fires.

The only singular objective benefit to gas vs induction is the ability to use any old cookware over an open flame instead of needing an induction pot or pan. But that's about it, other than the emotional attachment which I feel and I'm sure others feel. In this day and age however, that's probably not good enough of a reason to stick with combustion cooking.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#19

Hope their electricity isn't being generated with natural gas

> The rules would essentially require all new residential construction to have electric water heaters by 2027 and heat pumps instead of furnaces by 2029.

By the time this is fully in effect for a significant number of people (i.e., basically the 2030s), yeah, the electricity will be pretty green. The target is 90% renewable electricity by 2035, and the mix was already around 34% renewable in 2021 statewide.

It seems fairly prudent to require new construction to use the super-green electricity instead of building infrastructure to burn more dinosaur juice.

Re: Bay Area plan to ban natural gas

#20
My 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.
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