As the United States has begun transitioning away from the use of coal and petroleum as a source of electricity and fuel, natural gas has been viewed as a relatively benign fossil fuel. After all, natural gas produces less carbon dioxide when burned than those other fossil fuels. It remains the energy source in about half of California’s buildings.
But scientists have increasingly warned that methane, the main component of natural gas, is itself a key heat-trapping gas — 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide in the first twenty years after release, according to the Environmental Defense Fund. In addition to the carbon dioxide created by its burning, the inevitable leaks as natural gas is extracted and shipped, make gas a serious climate threat in its own right.
State policy calls for the electrification of buildings — the source of about 10 percent of California’s greenhouse gas emissions, mostly from natural gas. Several state agencies and many cities and counties are working on a variety of programs to promote electrification. But none have gone as far as the ordinance scheduled to come before the Berkeley City Council on July 9.
Once again, the City of Berkeley is considering a groundbreaking environmental policy: This time it’s a ban on natural gas hookups in all new buildings, starting January 1, 2020.
Berkeley is about to see a “wave of new multistory construction,” with at least 3,100 residential units currently planned, said Councilmember Kate Harrison, who introduced the measure. “These buildings will be in place for 100 years,” she said. “Emergency action is needed to prevent locking in the greenhouse gas and safety impacts” of natural gas.
In addition to the fuel’s impact on climate change, Harrison also noted that using natural gas means “pumping a toxic, flammable liquid over fault lines into our homes.” Cooking with gas is linked to asthma attacks and hospitalizations, hitting hardest in children and communities of color. A 2013 Lawrence Berkeley Lab study found that in 60 percent of the homes with gas stoves, the air pollution level violates federal standards for outdoor air. “Your Gas Stove is Bad for You and the Planet,” a recent guest editorial in The New York Times, reported that “a growing body of scientific evidence has shown that gas stoves throw off pollutants like nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide.” Natural gas also is a fire hazard. A 2017 study by the US Geological Services identified broken gas lines as a key risk factor during an earthquake. Much of the damage and loss of life after an earthquake is caused by fires from broken gas lines.
So far, no opposition to the proposed gas ban has emerged. But pushback is expected, since many builders and residents are unfamiliar with the relatively new technologies for electric heating, cooling, and cooking. The city council committee working on the bill held two hearings for developers, but none showed up. “The next step is outreach to builders and the business community,” Harrison said.
HT/Willie Soon
..INSANITY…..
These people are barking mad. There was not a technically coherent thread in any of that. The fact that there is no opposition says the are ignorant too.
“These buildings will be in place for 100 years,” she said.
Really, is that what is stated in the design specifications? I doubt that any building built now will still be standing in 30 years.
Go to Sydney Australia and they are falling down within less than 10 years!
In a fault zone, an ACTIVE fault zone, transitioning away from natural gas to remove a source of post-quake fires has its merits. To change (quote) Global Warming (un-quote) by an infinitesimal amount is silly.
Good. I’ll get my wood stove working and start cutting trees!
Does this directly clash with building affordable housing? California’s electricity is the most expensive in the nation. But who cares for children and communities of color?
That is minor idiocy compared to a bill circulating that is proposing that all affordable housing must be built using prevail wage. Talk about an oxymoron.
I can only imagine the meetings they must have to discuss it.
I’ve been in meetings like that. Then I resigned.
How do they propose to create the electricity?
Paul S July 8, 2019 at 8:48 am
How do they propose to create the electricity:
There’s this affordable housing building; next this asthma attacked and hospitalizationed, hardest hitted in children and communities of color, to burn to create electricity.
Safariman: You are a true environmentalist ! Wood stoves are a prime example using renewable energy, and since the fuel is natural and organic, we know it is good and safe for us and the environment. Some of my sarcasm about “natural and organic” comes from my high school chemistry class where I learned that about half of the naturally occurring organic chemicals are poisonous. There was a bottle of banana ester passed around and we were warned to be careful with it. The bottle was heavily marked with skull and crossbones and poison. In college biology, there was a one frame cartoon of a store display of mushrooms. On one end, it said Mushrooms- $1/pound, the other end said Mushrooms?- 5 cents/pound.
No, you really don’t understand the plan. Set yourself up a dung burner – the fuel will be delivered right to your doorstep.
Half of the world cooks with wood and dung. what could go wrong?
Absolutely everything is made from all natural ingredients.
Except about 4% of the CO2 is made from unnatural carbon.
Lot of things Berkeley has to consider: how to make unnatural CO2, unnatural methane, unnatural oxigen to oxidize aka combust aka burn all that other stuff.
Wait until they find out that water is the most potent greenhouse gas. No water for you.
Vancouver, BC is also planning to ban new natural gas hook ups, including phasing out existing commercial restaurants that use a gas range for cooking all their meals on. That would include ovens, such as pizza ovens. When these commercial eatery’s made some complaints that this was completely unfair since foods cooked with an open flame by a chef are much more desired by customers, (not to mention more economical) it was then revealed that ‘renewable’ natural gas would still be allowed. But Fortis, the gas company, said it could only supply 1% of the 108,000 NG customers with renewable gas, presumably methane from the local land fills. What a farce this has become, since in other jurisdictions that generate or import electricity from NG will actually produce more emissions when you consider CCGT is at best 60% efficient for electricity generation, while the nat gas itself is 95%+ efficient when used thermally for heat or cooking directly. And even less so, if the NG generation is backing up wind or solar electricity production for use in the cities instead of NG. So probably much more CO2 emissions from this wacky proposal.
This link is a few years old now, so not sure what all has transpired since, but the rabid left led by the former mayor, Gregor Robertson, is still pushing this wacky scheme in the name of climate change. The leftists are just hell bent on denying anyone access to clean burning natural gas.
https://business.financialpost.com/opinion/a-ban-on-natural-gas-could-be-coming-to-gastown-and-your-city-is-next
speaking of pizza ovens….and gas
At least 21 injured after gas explosion at vacant pizza restaurant in Florida shopping center
https://www.foxnews.com/us/at-least-21-injured-after-gas-explosion-at-vacant-pizza-restaurant-in-florida-shopping-center
Earthling2 : It is my understanding that a bill or bills are going through the California state legislature to eventually ban natural for cooking, heating, and generating electricity. New construction is to be !00% electric and then to retrofit older buildings and homes.
Where are they going to get the electricity? Solar and wind don’t work for keeping a city alive 24/7.
They will be getting electricity from over the state line by fossil fuel burning plants, thus the state will carbon free. Duh! This will obviously increase the total CO2 output and reduce efficiency by large numbers.
And then they will find a way to ban that electricity too.
And then they will really find out.
And I will enjoy watching. It’s worth living longer for.
Agreed, Mark!
Germany has shown the way….with such wonderful virtue, eliminating much power production in Germany, then importing energy from evil Earth-killers like the Danes and the French with their carbon burning and nuclear energy plants.
Philo, only bad company keeps a city alive 24/7!
The children shall be in bed latest 20:00. With the first light they should be up to gather firewood + potatoes for breakfast.
And parents should dim the whale oil lamps while sitting up reading the post or knitting.
But, but, but, …….. how will the restaurants cook with a wok on an electric stove?
People have just got to change what they do and how they live. This is a climate emergency – didn’t you get the memo? In the UK the parliament – a building containing 650 of the dimmest people in the land – have voted on it because a schoolgirl told them it was true. Councils are making declarations too. And we are, well, actually, just waffling because they don’t have a clue what they are doing. We should be grateful as the less they do the less they screw up things.
Natural gas in pipes is a liquid?
I’m all for Berkeley banning not just new construction NG but all forms of fossil fuels and petroleum products. And do it now. Show us that brave new world so that we may marvel
In addition to the fuel’s impact on climate change, Harrison also noted that using natural gas means “pumping a toxic, flammable liquid over fault lines into our homes.”
I had to laugh at that one myself. The Natural Gas pumped into houses by utilities is in gaseous form rather than liquid. Liquefied Natural Gas LNG is used mainly as an alternative fuel source in automobiles but not piped into homes.
Both liquefied NG and ESPECIALLY propane can be purchase in pressurized cylinders for home heating, camping and barbeque “grilling” ….. but the cylinders are affixed with “pressure regulators” ….. and its not smart to store those cylinders inside your home or business.
Don’t remind them…those will be vanished as well
Liquefied propane yes, liquefied NG no. NG is sold as a highly pressurized gas @ur momisugly approximately 3000 lbs/in^2 for cars and trucks. In order to liquefy it, it needs to be refrigerated, with is onerous for all but large scale transportation of NG (as in shipping overseas).
And methane isn’t toxic IIRC
Liquefied NG is liquefied for transport on large ships that can keep it refrigerated, not for use by mobile vehicles. The NG used in vehicles is a compressed gas, not a liquid. Propane is used in liquefied form, but not NG.
Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren’t lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.
~Dorothy Parker
Heh, ‘Big Hydrocarbon Bonde’.
=========================
+10^100
Dorothy Parker
She had a wonderful ability to skewer just about anyone or anything. In this case, suicide.
Convert natural gas at capital intensive $billion plants to electricity and lose 40% of the energy instead of direct combustion at the burner tip increases consumption and doubles the cost to the consumer. Great work democrats. Note: of course you can also ban natural gas power plants and we can get all of our power from Ivanpah style concentrated solar right? Shameful stupidity.
The sooner people realize the climate change scam is about harvesting gob loads of cash via electric bills from the middle class to Tom Steyer’s investments, the sooner this lunacy of corrupt cronyism capitalism will end. And it has nothing to do with affordable or reliable electricity, and certainly not about climate, which is the ruse.
Dennis
No joy for Ivanpah sans overnight natgas burning.
It is needed to keep the fuel “cooking” until sunrise when the bird fryers kick in and do their thing.
It absolutely boggles the mind, at how ideology trumps logic, facts, or reasoning or thinking a proposal through. ” The next step is outreach to builders and the business community” Harrison said. Good luck with that. Builders and bisinessmen live in the real world.
Double the bill for switching from natural gas to electric heating (+ water, drying) and double it again for being in California. Builders won’t notice the increased costs but consumers will.
You don’t need any more buildings. LA and San Francisco have proven that living on the streets works just fine. Of course let’s start with those wonderful legislators showing us the way.
“…hitting hardest in children and communities of color.”
No matter the logic or science in the discussion, whenever that emotional appeal is introduced I become skeptical.
Isn’t it exactly where this ordinance will hit hardest?
Children don’t pay the bills, the parents do. So it’ll hit every family no matter the community.
I have no knowledge of what issues the communities of color have in relation to work or money.
“communities of color” (said obviouly by a pasty white Dem bureaucrat) are filling up the hospitals because they are cooking with gas! This precious phraseology reminds me of the missionaries I met in Nigeria in the 1960s who were bringing “light” to the “dark” continent. Doing God’s work. All this modern rot by the left is very much like the missionaries plaints.
I thought we were supposed to be all equal by now. Why is there a need to remain separate and aloof by these loathesome virtuous drones. Why do all the types in the diversity bin need to be spoken for by white guardians? Why are binned folk so helpless and have such weak constitutions and need so much direction?
Surely communities of “color” must be sick and tired of the this paternalistic ugliness.
White isn’t a color?
CO2, unless you are called Greta.
No, white is not a colour, it’s all colours.
Because the Democrats are “for the poor”, …… and they have to keep them poor so that the poor people will keep voting for them.
You confuse a feature with a bug. How can the Calizuela leaders create class conflict if they don’t screw low income voters and blame it on the 1%?
Every building with indoor bathroom facilities has sewer vents belching methane. I suppose out houses will be coming back. Or outlaw defecation.
” I suppose out houses will be coming back”..?
Who needs outhouses, just sheet on the sidewalks like in Calipornia!
“Gas stove use and respiratory health among adults with asthma in NHANES III” here.
“Background: Gas stoves release respiratory irritants, such as nitrogen dioxide and other combustion by-products. Adults with asthma may be susceptible to the effects of gas stove exposure because of their underlying airway hyper responsiveness, but this association has been difficult to establish.
“Conclusions: Among adults with asthma, there was no apparent impact of gas stove use on pulmonary function or respiratory symptoms. These results should be reassuring to adults with asthma and their health care providers.”
Maybe some folks smell burnt Mercaptan and convince themselves they are having a reaction.
I find the smell of a ventless gas log reminds me of flue gas from a gas furnace. I get an involuntary sensory warning anytime I smell that indoors. It seems to burn my sinus linings when I’m around a ventless heater and I think it has to do with the Mercapatan oderant.
Un-stripped NG, at the wellhead, can consist of:
Pipeline gas spec, typical:
https://www.e-education.psu.edu/fsc432/content/natural-gas-composition-and-specifications
“Gas cooking, kitchen ventilation, and asthma, allergic symptoms and sensitization in young children – the PIAMA study” here.
“Background: Several studies reported inconsistent associations between using gas for cooking and respiratory symptoms or lung function in children.
“Methods: Data on respiratory and allergic symptoms and diagnoses were collected by yearly questionnaires in a population of over 3000 children participating in a birth cohort study on development of allergy and asthma. At 4 years of age, a sub‐sample of 647 children provided blood samples for antibody testing. Data on gas cooking and kitchen ventilation were collected when the children were 5 years old. Based on these data a model was constructed to determine the chance of accumulation of combustion products (CACP) in the kitchen.
“Results: No relationship was found between gas cooking and any of the respiratory or allergy outcomes except nasal symptoms. The overall results did not change when the ‘CACP’ was used as exposure variable instead, while the association for nasal symptoms decreased to borderline significance.
“Conclusion: Our results suggest that gas cooking per se is associated with nasal symptoms in young children and not with the other respiratory symptoms that were investigated. Taking kitchen ventilation characteristics into account did not lead to different conclusions in this population where, according to the classification system, the majority of households using gas for cooking have insufficient kitchen ventilation.”
It comes down to having proper ventilation.
Well, that should increase the price of existing homes. Way to go, Berkeley, and you’ll be making new starter homes more expensive, too. Of course, greedy builders will be blamed for that.
Anyone daft enough to want to live in Bezerkeley deserves all the punishments that they receive.
Bought and paid for pols making California more unaffordable for the middle class. And those that stay are locked into paying higher electric bills to the GreenSlime running their renewable energy shakedown schemes.
Gas hook-up ban in Berkeley, huh? Here’s my solution: collect all of the rubber tire treads thrown off of tire recaps, put them in a stove and burn them. Make sure you have a good stove pipe so the smell doesn’t gag you, but too bad for your neighbors, who are commies after all.
What was that Eric Clapton song, “If you want to hang out, you’ve got to take her out, propane.
Splendid.
That’s a JJ Cale song, to be a putz.
From the article: “And gas prices are expected to rise as the use of gas declines.”
Perhaps someone should introduce these people to the concept of the impact of supply and demand upon price.
I expect the price of gas to rise, because the extra demand for electricity will be met by means of natural gas power plants, with combined generation, transmission and distribution efficiency around 40%. So, natural gas usage will be increased by the feel-good ban on new natural gas hookups.
The lunatics in Berkeley, San Fran, Oakland are turning their communities into third world pits of devolution. They prove the adage that education alone does not result in wisdom.
New constructiom? Berkeley’s estimated 2017 population was about 8% higher than it was in 1950.
“Berkeley’s estimated 2017 population was about 8% higher than it was in 1950.” But divorce and smaller families with higher expectations mean more than 8% additional housing.
Brilliant move – this will insure that only the high tax payers can afford live in Berkeley and the poor will be relegated outside the city’s economic walls. /s
How ironic since the State of CA’s own vicious Title-24 regulations especially PUNISH the use of electric resistance heating as a horrifically inefficient heating source. Same with every other electric appliance.
And the rest of the country wonders why housing is so damned expensive in CA …
Resistive electric heating in a mild climate like California is very inefficient compared with heat pumps. Which can also act as air conditioners when it gets hot (due to AGW of course).
Feel free to carp, Kenji, but do try and get your facts in order. No sane person promotes resistive electric heating.
Of course, anyone thinking that natural gas is a liquid, might not be able to distinguish between different types of electric heating.
I’m sorry? What’s LNG?
So why aren’t Heat pumps the dominant heating/cooling appliance in CA? It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that a simple natural gas fired heater is cheaper to fabricate and operate … would it? And with current technology, these heaters are 97% efficient. Now tell me how efficient is that electron … by the time it reaches your heat pump? Get back to me when you get those facts in order.
I believe I found the exact 2013 LBL study, here: “Pollutant Exposures from Natural Gas Cooking Burners: A Simulation-Based Assessment for Southern California”
Regular readers here will never guess how the study was carried out. I’m going to bold the relevant words.
“Background: Residential natural gas cooking burners (NGCBs) can emit substantial quantities of pollutants, and they are typically used without venting range hoods.
“Objective: We quantified pollutant concentrations and occupant exposures resulting from NGCB use in California homes.
“Methods: A mass-balance model was applied to estimate time-dependent pollutant concentrations throughout homes in Southern California and the exposure concentrations experienced by individual occupants. We estimated nitrogen dioxide (NO2), carbon monoxide (CO), and formaldehyde (HCHO) concentrations for 1 week each in summer and winter for a representative sample of Southern California homes. The model simulated pollutant emissions from NGCBs as well as NO2 and CO entry from outdoors, dilution throughout the home, and removal by ventilation and deposition. Residence characteristics and outdoor concentrations of NO2 and CO were obtained from available databases. We inferred ventilation rates, occupancy patterns, and burner use from household characteristics. We also explored proximity to the burner(s) and the benefits of using venting range hoods. Replicate model executions using independently generated sets of stochastic variable values yielded estimated pollutant concentration distributions with geometric means varying by < 10%.
"Results: The simulation model estimated that—in homes using NGCBs without coincident use of venting range hoods—62%, 9%, and 53% of occupants are routinely exposed to NO2, CO, and HCHO levels that exceed acute health-based standards and guidelines. NGCB use increased the sample median of the highest simulated 1-hr indoor concentrations by 100, 3,000, and 20 ppb for NO2, CO, and HCHO, respectively.
“Conclusions: Reducing pollutant exposures from NGCBs should be a public health priority. Simulation results suggest that regular use of even moderately effective venting range hoods would dramatically reduce the percentage of homes in which concentrations exceed health-based standards.”
It appears they made no measurements and quantified no outcomes.
It’s
turtlesmodels all the way downCan we get a MODEL showing definitively that the behavior displayed by Berkeley will lead to massive increases in housing costs, more people living in the streets and by 2035, people will be living in their cars that have no gas and eating out of garbage cans? After all, models never lie so this should work to terrify the morons who go along with this slow suicide.
I had a good friend back in the 1970s who called the place Berserkley. She moved there in the late 1970s and said it was just as nuts as she’d thought it would be.
If it was nuts then, what’s it like now? (Rhetorical question, no answer required.)
My gas stove is the only thing that kept me warm last winter when a slop/slush storm knocked out the power for nearly 400,000 people in my area. No, I did not just burn gas. I heated water for tea and hot cocoa, and I lit the stove with kitchen matches.
Sara,
When I lived in Massachusetts there were several times when our power was knocked out by ice storms for days. Kept the main part of the house manage-ably warm with the gas stove top burners.
House had CO detectors on all floors. They never went off.
Having natural gas saved our butts from high electric bills. And I understand electric rates in Mass have gone up 50% since I sold the house and left in 2012, meanwhile the natural gas rates have gone down. Getting people stuck in electricity with no other option is the game being played here by the GreenSlimers.
Affordable natural gas is an existential threat to the wind and solar renewable energy scam. So this war on Natural Gas is being funded from Tom Steyer and the rest of the GreenSlime who have bought and paid for the pols now doing their bidding.
Not only that but gas is a necessity for emergency home heating in winter when the wind turbines are frozen and solar panels are covered with snow.
I’ve cooked with both gas and electric ranges and much prefer gas.
Go for it!
We like large-scale lab rat experiments, in CA at least.
“Transitioning”? California has added some wind and solar farms but I doubt enough to make up for the increased demand during the same period despite all the propaganda. Gas is still king. Hydro in and out of state next and they ‘claim’ solar is third but only in their mind. You can’t get an honest answer. The net/net for gas usage will probably be a wash.
You can’t get a straight up, honest answer on how much wind and solar truly costs per KWh b/c of tax credits at the state and federal levels, and directives to utilities to purchase when available eve if not needed, thus wind/solar producers can get paid to not produce, and the cost passed through to the rate payers.
Yep.
‘As the United States has begun transitioning away from the use of coal and petroleum as a source of electricity and fuel’
I didn’t read any further.
Say it enough times, and people will believe the Big Lie.
Natural gas is used to dehydrate gypsum on the steps to make cement. Takes 60 cement trucks to deliver the concrete for the pad for a modern fan/turbine.
Nancy Pelosie says Natural Gas is not a fossil fuel.