Don’t let culture wars over gas stoves blind us to science
What’s the growing trend that Germany, Washington state, New York City, Ithaca, Montreal and now the city of Beacon have joined?
In all these places, new homes and small buildings will stop installing most appliances fueled by polluting methane gas by year’s end, extending the practice to larger buildings within three years or less.
Energy, climate, and building experts from municipalities to states to nations are all reaching the conclusion that electrification is the most cost-effective and energy-efficient way to tame the pollution from burning fuels in buildings. But that hasn’t prevented the fossil fuel industry and its allies from assailing our clean-energy future with culture wars over gas stoves or scaremongering over grid reliability.
Research uncovering gas stoves’ health risks has been accumulating for decades. The American Medical Association, American Lung Association, New York State Public Health Association, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, and all New York state chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics deem gas stoves a health hazard.
A recent public statement by a U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission official just served to bring this long-standing issue into the limelight — and some saw it as an opportunity to help spark an anti-electrification backlash.
New York’s climate scoping plan recommends a prohibition on gas stove replacements starting in 2035. The provocateurs of the controversy appear not to realize that next decade, New Yorkers may want a gas stove as badly as they want lead paint or asbestos in their homes today.
While power failures may not warrant delaying electrification, they indeed are a cause for serious concern. No amount of gas can help with electrically powered medical equipment, for instance. The frequency and duration of storm-related outages have been creeping up due to the worsening climate crisis and lackadaisical maintenance of our power distribution infra
structure. Inadequate winterization of substations caused widespread power outages in the Buffalo area during the historic Christmas blizzard. Our aging grid needs significant investments regardless of our climate goals.
Similarly, electrification isn’t just about the climate; it’s also about doing more with less, more cleanly, more healthfully, and more affordably. Instead of maligning this beautiful future with disinformation and divisiveness, let’s use beneficial electrification as a reason to unite for safer, healthier energy and demand a robust, world-class electric grid.