SYRACUSE, NY – National Grid will today urge New York leaders to reject the goal of converting almost all buildings in the state to electric heating by 2050, arguing that natural gas infrastructure should not be abandoned to halt climate change .
Instead, existing gas lines may one day supply customers with what National Grid calls “fossil-free gas,” a mix of methane harvested from landfills or farms and hydrogen produced using solar or wind power.
That way, utilities argue, not all customers would have to replace their gas stoves with electric heat pumps. And they say the state’s heating system could cut carbon emissions without becoming dependent on a single fuel, electricity.
National Grid is launching a counter-proposal to the country’s climate protection council’s draft plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which aims to ban new gas heating installations in homes and businesses in the coming years. State officials are conducting public hearings on the draft plan (including in Syracuse on April 26, see details below). The planning should be completed by the end of the year.
In an online interview with reporters Monday, Rudolph Wynter, president of National Grid NY, said gas should continue to play a role in heating some buildings even after many buildings go all-electric.
“The current narrative that we’re hearing … is essentially electrifying everything,” Wynter said. “And we have a vision that’s a bit hybrid.”
Wynter said the utility has committed to phasing out the use of conventional natural gas. In its place, he suggests using exhaust gases recovered from sources such as landfills, sewage treatment plants and dairy farms. This ‘renewable natural gas’ would be supplemented with up to 20% volume of hydrogen, which can be produced by the electrolysis of water using solar or wind power.
“So in 2050 we’re essentially eliminating fossil gas from the grid and using RNG (renewable natural gas) and green hydrogen,” he said.
National Grid’s proposal is likely to provoke skepticism from some environmental activists.
NY Renews, a coalition of prominent environmental groups, is calling both renewable natural gas and green hydrogen “false solutions” being promoted by gas utilities to gain a foothold in the future energy system.
“It is fair to say that the only scalable, effective and ultimately legitimate building climate solution, building electrification, poses an existential threat to the gas industry,” the group wrote in a 2021 position paper.
Heating and cooling buildings accounts for about a third of New York’s greenhouse gas emissions, so buildings are at the heart of the state’s climate plan. Nearly 60% of the state’s 7.4 million homes heat with natural gas.
Under a law passed in 2019, New York has committed to becoming carbon neutral by 2050. The change could start much earlier. As early as 2024, the Climate Protection Council proposed a ban on gas heating in new apartments, which the legislature has not yet implemented.
The draft plan presented this year by the 22-strong climate protection council assumes that the heating of buildings will be switched to purely electrical heating. National Grid maintains that fossil-free gas should remain part of the solution.
That would make the system more affordable and resilient, Wynter argues.
Using existing gas infrastructure, including customer-owned furnaces, would reduce costs for customers compared to the all-electric option, he said. It would also increase reliability by providing a second source of heat alongside electricity, he said.
National Grid’s plan is for about 50% of the gas in its system to be a combination of renewable natural gas and hydrogen by 2040. By 2050, 100% of the gas should be “fossil-free”.
If the plan goes ahead, the utility estimates that around half of all customers will still be heated entirely by electricity, compared to 10% now. Many would switch to electric heat pumps to replace current heating oil or propane gas systems.
About a quarter of all customers would continue to heat with fossil-free gas; and the remaining 25% would have “hybrid” heating systems that include both electric heat pumps and gas stoves, Wynter said.
Some customers would wish they could heat their homes with heat pumps for most of the year, but switch to gas appliances during the coldest months, he said.
Under the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act 2019, the Climate Action Council must submit its final plan to the Governor and Legislature by January 1, 2023. After that, the state will formulate regulations to implement the plan by January 1. 2024
Comments on the state plan can be submitted online until June 10th.
An in-person public hearing will be held at 4:00 p.m. on April 26 at the Gateway Center of the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse.
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