I had one of those old out-dated A/C units in my house and I replaced it with a duct free mini-split and 2 room A/C's and my summer electric bill is $200 less a month.

I'm terrified of gas being in my house. In Las Vegas I lived in an all-electric 433 unit townhouse complex and loved every minute of it.

Yeah, ductless mini-splits are great for a lot of applications. They're ubiquitous throughout Europe and Asia and South America and gaining more and more market share here. So much more efficient and effective at providing even cooling and heating. Get rid of those room A/C units and add another interior unit to ductless system! :tup:

Stop it with your right-wing culture war talking points! We like weed...so screw the Earth!

Sure but that's only in downtown and/or highrise areas, no?

I have at least three separate properties that are connected to Gaz Métro (nowadays Énergir) but they're all in commercial areas in downtown Sherbrooke. AFAIK, no residential neighborhood in this province (areas with individual homes) can do what's done in Berkeley, i.e. having gas water heaters and gas stoves and gas clothes dryers. In fact I have never seen such appliances in the province. I've seen NG furnaces (for hot water heating systems) and NG stoves in my buildings (for my restaurant tenants), but that's it.

Maybe in Montreal Island highrises they have gas appliances, but again, doubtful. I know a few people who live in urban areas (sis in Verdun, good friend on Park Ave just on the other side of Mt Royal, family friend in Westmount, etc.) and no one has anything but electric appliances.

Haha

Yeah it’s much less enjoyable cooking on an electric stove imo. I have an electric stove currently and hate it.

My neighboring community is also planning on adopting similar regulations. Moving off of gas in earthquake prone areas probably isn't the worst thing. I just hope they offer a very long transition for existing structures to convert to electric. My duplex has gas heat, stoves, dryers and hot water heaters and an electric service (and wiring) ill equipped to handle any expansion.

Many places {like British Columbia} are developing natural gas on a huge scale trying to justify it as being a clean energey source to make themselves feel better which is complete bunk.

Berkely knows that there is absolutely, positively NOTHING clean about natural gas. It is a dirty fossil fuel. Full stop. Calling NG clean is like those that espouse "clean coal", there is no such thing. NG truly scares me because it allows governments and companies to proclaim that they are reducing emissions by using it creating a totally false narrative. Natural gas is very bad for the environment but governments {like BC} try to convinve their populations that it is an ideal "bridge" technology and hoping people will fall for it for they can get their hands on all that juicy revenue. This is a very dangerous road as it prolongs our economy's essential requirement of getting off all fossil fuels energy.

The good people of Berkely know that we have no time to waste in getting off ALL fossil fuels if we are to avert catastophy.

Read the title of the thread.

NEW buildings

Are they even going to require anything of existing properties? Typically these things will require only for new or remodeled structures, with the thought that eventually they'll get them all...
I don't think they are doing it for earthquake reasons, additionally the prevalent new gas lines are flexible.

A cleaner energy more accurately. From a short term pollution point of view, it emits no SOX, NOX, or other smog forming emissions and no particulate matter during the burning of natural gas.

I think we often (in the developed world) view air pollution in terms of climate change when a lot of the world and geographies still battle smog and particulate matter.

According to the city of Berkeley, natural gas appliances account for 27 percent of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions.

Yea I’ve asked and looked where they got that figure from but nothing from the article posted. That figures seems particularly inflated.

San Jose Approves Ban Of Natural Gas In New Construction Projects
By Kiet Do
KPIX.com
September 17, 2019

From LAist:

These San Gabriel Valley Restaurant Owners Think Giving Up Gas Stoves Will Make Their Food Mushy

BY JOSIE HUANG IN FOOD ON SEPTEMBER 20, 2019 4:05 PM

https://laistassets.scprdev.org/i/9f...12a3-eight.jpg
Chef Chun Lei dishes up shrimp over a gas stove in the kitchen of the Shanghailander Palace in Arcadia. (Josie Huang/LAist)

In the kitchen of Shanghailander Palace in Arcadia, chef Chun Lei tosses raw shrimp into a wide wok bubbling noisily with oil. BAM! A sizzling thunderclap. Flames shoot out from under the wok. The shrimp turns a lovely pink.

Cooking with gas is dramatic, sweaty, and part of the rhythm in the fabled kitchens of San Gabriel Valley's Chinese restaurants. But some chefs like Lei worry that days of the gas stove could be numbered.

"When it comes to taste, this will have an impact," Lei said in Mandarin.

California is moving to eliminate its dependence on fossil fuels like natural gas as it works to become carbon-neutral by 2045. And that has those in the gas industry — and loyal users — worried about their future, and speaking out now.

https://laistassets.scprdev.org/i/ba...12a6-eight.jpg
A volcanic burst of heat shoots out of one of the gas stoves at Shanghailander Palace in Arcadia. (Josie Huang/KPCC)

While no law requires Californians to ditch their gas stoves and other appliances, state regulators have identified electricity as the cleaner alternative. Some city officials are taking an accelerated path to all-electric buildings; both Berkeley and San Jose recently moved to ban gas hook-ups in new construction.

In Los Angeles, Mayor Eric Garcetti announced a Green New Deal in April. The proposal calls for all new buildings in the city to be carbon-neutral by 2030, and for 100% of buildings — new and existing — to hit that goal by 2050. Santa Monica officials this year adopted a plan that aims to reduce carbon emissions in the city by 80% as of the year 2030.

Stoves consume far less gas than water or space heaters, but they generate more emotions tied to cooking and culture — and therefore, more debate.

Lei, who has been cooking with gas for 17 years, says preparing meals over an open flame gives dishes the perfect texture and chewiness, which Mandarin speakers describe as "Q" or "QQ." While some newer models of electric cooktops using induction heat up faster than gas and do better in product testing, Lei still worries the food could turn out mushy.

"I feel like there'd be a lot of problems if you use electric," Lei said.

https://laistassets.scprdev.org/i/2d...129d-eight.jpg
Kelly Fan (l.), a restaurant owner visiting from Anchorage, dines with her granddaughter Angela Fan (r.) at Shanghailander Palace. (Josie Huang/LAist)

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Charles Lu, owner of the Shanghailander Palace in Arcadia, has become an outspoken proponent of gas stoves this year. (Josie Huang/LAist)

[...]

Read the rest by clicking this link: https://laist.com/2019/09/20/san-gab...rence-food.php

That's not a problem at all. The situation will obviously stabilize in the future at a nice equilibrium point where customers will be able to choose between "dishes with the perfect texture and chewiness" at a premium (due to a properly-designed carbon tax) or carbon-neutral "mushy food" at a lower pricepoint.

Nothing new there - the poor and the rich have never had the exact same things on their plates ever since the beginning of humanity anyway. I fail to see why that's supposed to be a big deal this time.