Grateful to San Jose for backing all-electric homes

Thanks for publishing Robert Whitehair’s letter “New building codes benefit owners of existing homes” (Mercurynews.com, Oct. 17): As a 21-year resident of San Jose, I couldn’t agree more that building codes that incentivize or require all-electric construction will benefit our entire community.

Given that buildings are the second-highest source of emissions in our city, we have a

huge opportunity to clean up our air and protect our climate by ensuring that new construction is powered with electricity rather than outdated natural gas, which is largely made up of methane.

I’m inspired by the many benefits of using electricity rather than gas to power our buildings, including that it’s better for our health, safer during natural disasters, much better for the climate, and more cost-effective in the long run.

As a mother, I’m grateful to Mayor Sam Liccardo and the San Jose City Council members for supporting building electrification to protect our families’ health and climate.

— Deanna Pursai,

San Jose