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New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

nytimes.com

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Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#491

Post by rgmerk »

scatters wrote: post #84
its-summertime wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But is it more efficient overall? Gas to elec, infrastructure losses, etc. vs just gas to heat?

Sure. A heat pump only needs to be 170% efficient to make back the generation losses. As for infrastructure losses, natural gas distribution has leaks as well. Also, if the power plant is integrated into a CHP system to heat nearby households then generation gets back some percent.

Good point.

Methane leaks are much more environmentally damaging than often appreciated because methane is such a potent greenhouse gas.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#492

Post by ncallaway »

speakfreely wrote: post #426
tcfhgj wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What can be stepped up fast is wind and solar energy. And a heat pump is superior to gas even if the grid consists 100% out of gas. Further, you don't build a building built for gas when have to switch to electricity in the future anyway when the grid is even cleaner.

> What can be stepped up fast is wind and solar energy. I don't know who told you this. Can you point to any large city that is running on purely wind & solar right now? As far as I'm aware, there's not even a large regional city that has demonstrated this can work with current battery technology. I would be really happy to be wrong on this, but as of right now, it's not an option and we need to be realistic about th…

> Can you point to any large city that is running on purely wind & solar right now?

That wasn’t their claim at all, so it seems questionable to demand they prove this.

It’s like if someone said “cheerios are good for the heart”, and you asked someone to demonstrate that nobody ever had a heart attack while eating cheerios. You’re challenging an exaggerated version of the claim that was made, not the actual claim.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#493

Post by dathinab »

IMHO it should say "especially stoves".

While gas stoves are nicer for cooking then simple electrical stoves, induction stoves have become comparatively cheap and can be roughly as good as gas stoves.

At the same time having gas stoves is associated with a non small number of health risk especially with subpar ventilation and also associated with a non small risk for pretty bad accidents of all kinds.

So a ban on gas stoves is IMHO overdue.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#494

Post by iamdamian »

justeleblanc wrote: post #473
iamdamian wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate you digging up this information, this is exactly what's been lacking in press coverage of the issue. If you're telling me that fully eliminating gas stoves in the U.S. (something that will not happen in our lifetimes and will come at great political and personal cost) is going to reduce U.S.-specific emissions by just 1%, I think I'm even more convinced that this regulation should not have been passed. W…

We can get rid of a whole percent in emissions by giving up nothing important, and you think it's not a regulation that the government should pass?! What should the threshold for a regulation to pass, in your opinion? Should it cut single-handedly emissions by 2% on its own? 5%? 10%? 50%?

Based on the information you've provided, I don't think we can get rid of a whole percent, since that would require the entire country to completely get rid of gas stoves and also for their new electric stoves to be powered by something that does not produce emissions.

I know you'll disagree, but my take is that the upside (<1% savings over the course of, say, 30 years) is outweighed by the downside (lack of ability to cook or boil water during a power outage, far worse cooking experience).

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#495

Post by fwungy »

tcfhgj wrote: post #429
fwungy wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany thought they'd have cheap Russian gas from Nordstream. Now they're looking to move manufacturing to the US because energy is too expensive. Look at it this way, even is CO2 levels are primarily anthropogenic, most of the world isn't willing to do anything about it substantial (i.e. Global South). In which case the Western economies martyring themselves isn't going to change anything. OTOH, if climate change i…

Are you seriously chasing the global south while the west is responsible for this mess 90% while still abusing the global south for cheap labour? > OTOH, if climate change is not primarily anthropogenic the West martyring itself with expensive green energy decisions is a disastrous mistake Yikes No comment

Global South, i.e. BRICS+, sells and consumes huge amounts of oil.

Russia has proven mineral reserves of $75T, most in the world by a fat margin. If they stop selling their oil they're done, and so are China, India, Japan, and parts of Europe. BRICS don't have the ability to drop oil without catastrophic impacts on their food and energy systems.

>Yikes

Climate science is hard. The margins of error are wide. They already have a track record of being overly aggressive on predictions.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#496

Post by SheepSlapper »

rhaway84773 wrote: post #255

The reactions to the gas hookup ban really reminds me of how insular Americans really are. They can’t even imagine a world where gas does not come in pipes, when arguably that’s how the vast majority of the world lives. You want a gas stove? Buy a gas stove, and get a cylinder. No one is stopping you from doing that. Just don’t expect everyone else to subsidize running that gas in a pipe up to your gas stove.

What subsidizing? I built my house, I had to pay someone to dig into the street to hook up to the gas lines and then fix the road. Then I had to pay the gas company to install a meter and turn on service at my new address. And finally, they send me a bill every month for the gas I use.

Having that gas hookup saves me a ton of hassle during the winter months when, inevitably, power goes out and I need to keep my place warm for a day or two (or more, though rarely) while I wait for service to be restored. My neighbors appreciate it as well, as they can come get warm in front of my gas fireplace and cook on my gas range.

I have yet to see a downside of having gas as an option, it's only helped ESPECIALLY given the geographic realities of where I live (feet of snow overnight, subzero temps for weeks/months). Ironically the pushbacks against people who are PRO gas proves how insular the anti-gas crowd is, because apparently they can't imagine a reason someone would NEED that as an option

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#497

Post by TaylorAlexander »

annexrichmond wrote: post #383
arijun wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have the same opinion on fire escapes? After all, it should be my choice to endanger myself so I can pay a little less in rent.

And who is protesting the existence of fire escapes? Since my argument was about freedom of choice, that couldn’t be more of a false equivalence.

The briefest of search finds a page claiming that landlords opposed fire escape regulation when it was introduced, as it was costly and supposedly unattractive. I would not be surprised if some of them argued for freedom of choice in the matter.

https://americacomesalive.com/the-invention-of-the-fire-esca...

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#498

Post by heatmiser »

engineer_22 wrote: post #463
ahoy wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I _rent_ a home, as do a full half of new york state residents. I'd love an electric stove. Every rental I've ever lived in has a gas stove and no fume hood. The full half of new yorkers who rent - almost 20 million people - mostly get whatever theirlandlord picked. So when I read posts like this, decrying government overreach, I wonder if you've ever been poor? Have you ever lived here? Do you know what youre talkin…

[flagged]

Source? I am interested to know where the young people are leaving to.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#499

Post by bluescrn »

philip1209 wrote: post #174

Electricity is a universal protocol - you can generate it with multiple different energy sources, ranging from gas to nuclear. I think this change future-proofs constructions, and makes our infrastructure less fragile.

Redundancy is good.

If you can cook and keep warm on both gas and electricity, then an outage of one or the other is much less of an issue.

Re: New York to ban natural gas, including stoves, in new buildings

#500

Post by Panzer04 »

PM_me_your_math wrote: post #281
philip1209 wrote: post #174

Electricity is a universal protocol - you can generate it with multiple different energy sources, ranging from gas to nuclear. I think this change future-proofs constructions, and makes our infrastructure less fragile.

There are about 3.5 million total housing units in NYC. Say half of them needed electricity to heat the space all winter. The grid simply cannot deliver on that load. That sounds pretty fragile to me.

They clearly do just fine in summar, and heat pumps use basically the same amount of power in either direction. I don’t see why the grid would be overloaded.
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