Seeking to do their part to avert climate change, dozens of cities are exploring ways to limit natural gas heating in new homes. One city may also require existing homeowners to make a switch.
After two decades of reducing emissions across the coastal city leaders are proposing to ban natural gas in residential buildings with the hope of curtailing the potent emissions that rise from that industry’s infrastructure.Credit…Ruth Fremson/The New York Times
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BELLINGHAM, Wash. — As a progressive-minded city nestled where the Cascade mountains reach the sea, Bellingham, Wash., has long been looking to scale back its contribution to climate change. In recent years, city leaders have converted the streetlights to low-power LEDs, provided bikes for city employees and made plans to halt the burning of sewage solids.
But while the efforts so far have lowered the city’s emissions, none have come close to erasing its carbon footprint. Now, Bellingham is looking to do something that no other city has yet attempted: adopt a ban on all residential heating by natural gas.
The ambitious plan set for consideration by the City Council in the coming weeks had already prompted vigorous debate over how much one small city should try to do to avert climate catastrophe, at a time when the federal government was putting less emphasis on halting the trajectory of rising temperatures.
“What we’ve got here is a conversation that is taking place in living rooms, in board rooms, in City Councils around the country,” said Michael Lilliquist, a Bellingham council member. “What is the proportionate threat? What is the proportionate response?”
Natural gas has long been embraced as a cleaner alternative to coal-fired electricity. Years ago, power companies began phasing out coal, and natural gas emerged as the nation’s leading source of electricity. But natural gas offers its own troubling contribution of greenhouse gases — including methane leaks from natural gas infrastructure — and its production has begun to clash with environmental goals that now include not only cleaning up pollution, but also slowing the rise in global temperatures.
In places like the Northwest, which benefits from a robust network of hydro-powered electricity, the move to detach from natural gas may be within reach — but at a cost.
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