Implementation Phases

Prohibit fossil fuel hookups at new residential and commercial buildings as of 2025 or as soon after that as permitted by state law/regulation.

Prohibit fossil fuel hookups at all new buildings no later than 2040.

Challenges

At this time, municipalities can’t outright ban fossil hookups because that would violate the New York building code. There are three potential paths forward:

• Offer incentives/point based energy code that encourages not using any fossil fuels in the house. Ithaca, NY is using this route.
• Based on materials presented at meetings of panels convened under New York’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, it appears that new regulations set through this law may allow municipalities to ban fossil fuel hookups in the future.
• An effort led by Bedford, Ithaca, and Saratoga Springs, NY aims to use municipal policing powers to ban fossil hookups.

Developers will have to alter their designs of new buildings to be powered solely by electricity.

The challenge of providing heat to a building during an electrical outage is discussed under the action “EL1. Require heat pumps.”

Example Municipalities

Several municipalities have already implemented this action… 

• In total, 42 municipalities across the country have enacted legislation to replace fossil fuels with electricity in newly constructed dwellings.
• Brookline Massachusetts prohibits new fossil fuel infrastructure on any “new building” within its purview
• Berkeley, California‘s ordinance on prohibiting fossil fuel hookups is a robust guide and example for municipalities across the country

Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Reductions

Data

New residential housing units in municipality: 65 units per year [ Town of Bethlehem Demographic and Growth Analysis 1991-2018 , p. 9]

New commercial units in municipality: 7 units per year [ Town of Bethlehem Demographic and Growth Analysis 1991-2018 , p. 37]

GHG emissions due to natural gas, fuel oil and propane as fossil fuel used in residential units : 37,837 metric tonnes CO2e [  Bethlehem, NY 2010 Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory, Page 51-74 Table 1 ]

GHG emissions due to natural gas, fuel oil and propane as fossil fuel used in commercial units : 13,094 metric tonnes CO2e [ Bethlehem, NY 2010 Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory, Page 51-74 Table 1]

Assumptions

Phase 1 implementation calls for prohibiting fossil fuel hook-ups in all new residential and commercial buildings.

Methodology 

We calculated

• The average CO2e due to combustion of fossil fuel per unit per year for residential and commercial buildings.
• GHG emissions due to use of fossil fuels per year for all newly constructed commercial and residential units.
• The reductions in emissions by prohibiting fossil fuel usage in new residential and commercial buildings.

Results

320 metric tonnes of CO2e is reduced when fossil fuel and deliverable fuels are prohibited for new constructions.

This results in MODERATE GHG emissions reductions.

Climate Smart Communities (CSC) & Clean Energy Communities (CEC) Link

This action is also related to CSC and CEC actions for which municipalities can earn points toward certification. If municipalities include this prohibition in a local Stretch Building Code, they can:  

CEC Actions:

• Access 1200 CEC points and also action grants of up to $50k through the CEC NYStretch Energy Code Action. After completing this CEC action, municipalities can also:

CSC Actions:

• Earn 10 CSC points through PE6 Action: NYStretch Energy Code. 

Co-benefits

There are multiple co-benefits to completing this action, including:

• Avoided  environmental damages of fossil fuel spills/leakages.
• Significant delivery infrastructure avoided costs.
• Avoid utility un-depreciated assets by retiring rather than replacing aging pipes.
• No natural gas, so no carbon monoxide.