New Yorkers to stop paying for other people’s gas hookups under new bill

New York just took a major step to put gas in the past.

Last week, legislators repealed a decades-old rule incentivizing new gas connections. Currently, building owners who are within 100 feet of an existing gas main line can get a new gas hookup at no out-of-pocket expense; instead, the costs of these new connections are spread across the entire utility customer base.

The bill, A8888 in the Assembly and S8417 in the Senate, now awaits Gov. Kathy Hochul’s review.

“This legislation will keep families from having to pay their hard-earned money to subsidize the cost of new gas hookups,” said New York Assembly Speaker Carl E. Heastie (D) in a statement.

From 2017 to 2021, New Yorkers spent roughly $200 million per year connecting new homes and other buildings to the gas network under the ​“100-foot rule,” as it’s often called, according to an analysis by energy think tank RMI. Those subsidies helped add nearly 170,000 customers to the system.

“By socializing the cost [for new gas hookups], we’re raising energy prices for everyone on the gas system,” Abe Scarr, energy and utilities program director at nonprofit U.S. PIRG Education Fund, told Canary Media. From 2020 to 2022 in utility National Grid’s territory, for example, the average cost pushed onto existing customers for a new gas connection was about $5,000 to $14,000, he said.

Due in part to the boilers, furnaces, and stoves that burn gas, buildings are the state’s largest source of planet-warming pollution. In 2021, three out of five households in New York used gas for heating.

But the Empire State is striving to break up with fossil fuels. In 2019, New York passed the landmark Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which set a goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030, compared with 1990 levels.

Advocates for years have been trying to help New Yorkers wean off gas with an ambitious legislative package called the NY Home Energy Affordable Transition (HEAT) Act. That bill proposed to end not only the 100-foot rule but also utilities’ obligation to provide gas service to any customer who wants it. The legislation would also require utilities to carry out neighborhood electrification projects that decommission discrete portions of the gas system, and would cap energy bills at 6% of income for low- and moderate-income customers.

But since 2022, the NY HEAT Act has failed to become law. Earlier this month, sponsors of the bill tried to pass a watered-down version. Anticipating it wouldn’t get the votes either, legislators focused instead on passing only the most popular and easy-to-implement measure: ending the 100-foot rule, said Laura Shindell, New York state director for the advocacy group Food and Water Watch.

Now that lawmakers have approved the reform, Shindell said she’s hopeful that Gov. Hochul (D) will sign the bill. The governor has included the measure and other major NY HEAT Act provisions in her previous proposed budgets.

The bill complements New York’s first-in-the-nation requirement that, starting next year, most new buildings with seven stories or fewer be all-electric. As of 2029, new buildings over seven stories need to be all-electric. Meanwhile, with the 100-foot rule repealed, existing building owners would no longer receive subsidies when they switch from fuel oil or propane to gas.

If the bill becomes law, New York would join California, Colorado, and most recently Maryland, in eliminating subsidies for gas line extensions statewide. Encouraging gas use is inconsistent with Maryland’s 2022 Climate Solutions Now Act, state regulators wrote in their order earlier this month. ​“A customer that prefers to use natural gas should, therefore, be expected to pay the actual cost of obtaining that service without artificial incentives to do so.”

In New York, Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt (R) and other bill opponents decried the legislation, saying it will make gas unaffordable and prevent expansion of the gas system. Supporters of the repeal said the criticisms are distorted.

“The conversations we heard on the floor of the People’s House from the other side of the aisle were misleading and riddled with fearmongering,” Speaker Heastie said. ​“This bill doesn’t take away the ability to connect to gas, or force anyone to stop using gas in their homes.”

For individuals weighing whether to get a gas hookup, the repeal communicates the actual cost of that decision, Scarr noted — and could cause them to discover that gas isn’t the best route.

“It depends on the jurisdiction and … the local cost of gas and electricity, but in many places, the economics of going all electric are quite favorable,” Scarr said. That’s in part thanks to uber-efficient heat pumps, he added. For households on delivered fuels, these heater/​air conditioners can reduce energy bills by an average of $840 per year, according to electrification nonprofit Rewiring America. Getting off gas can save families an average of $60 per year.

Scrapping the 100-foot rule is long overdue, but New York will need to go much further, Richard Schrader, director of New York government affairs at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in a statement. ​“To fully align New York’s gas utility system with its climate and affordability goals, lawmakers must pass the broader reforms in the NY HEAT Act.”