‘Electrify Everything’ advocates are once again attempting to circumvent voters to pass backdoor natural gas bans. That’s because time and again voters have expressed that they want consumer choice when it comes to how they heat their homes and cook their food. In fact, many Americans want to keep their gas stoves.
Source: Grist, December 2023
The latest example of this can be seen in the International Code Council’s (ICC) – the nonprofit standards organization that develops model codes and standards for new construction – 2024 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC). The current IECC draft is being challenged by a diverse range of stakeholders because it leaves natural gas out of the equation in favor of electrification mandates that disregard the importance of energy efficiency.
The American Gas Association and other energy industry associations, alongside housing organizations and the ICC’s Northeast regional branch, are appealing the 2024 IECC on several measures, including:
- The 2024 IECC’s electrification measures are outside the scope of the ICC;
- the draft fails to include alternative perspectives;
- and electrification is not the same as energy efficiency which does not require fuel switching to see improvements.
AGA President and CEO Karen Harbert explained to Fox News:
“They’re incentivizing electrification and discriminating against the natural gas industry by excluding it from being part of the code. That really is anticompetitive behavior.
“If you are about energy efficiency, you should say, ‘We are about energy efficiency however you get there’ — being fuel neutral. But in this case, they are prescribing the way to get there, and it only includes electrification.”
Backdoor Gas Bans
eNGOs’ ICC strategy is a continuation of the backdoor gas bans that they perfected at the local level where very niche building code updates and mandates are used to essentially ban natural gas. This strategy has been employed by more than 100 municipalities across the United States and Building Electrification Initiative’s Jenna Tatum even admitted to S&P Global:
“I think that the term gas ban might not work…But I think that a policy that encourages or requires all electric new construction works everywhere.”
Harbert clarified to Fox News that this process is being repeated at a larger level, purposely using the “very wonky, very technical” IECC process to pass their all-electrification agenda.
Bottom Line
Pursuing bans by less than legislative means has become the dominant strategy for electrification advocates after the Ninth Circuit struck down the city of Berkeley’s direct ban and upheld the decision on appeal.
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