Very true for the average apartment.

Two (huge) obstacles for induction cooktops:

1) They're still more expensive than a non-induction electric cooktop. Might not be a big deal in a $1 million apartment buildout, but if someone is remodeling a block of apartments that are going to rent out no matter what they contain, the remodelers are going to get the cheaper non-induction equipment.

2) They depend on the type of cookware used. Again, not a big deal if you're a homeowner spending $$$ on a remodel and cookware to go with it. But it is a big deal if you're trying to rent out apartments to people who have cookware and you don't want to get constant calls about the fancy cooktop not working.

It's not realistic to expect the average NYC apartment to get fancy induction cooktops. They're just going to get the cheap electric units.

I don't know where to buy cooktops in the US so I can't do a comparison, but on one of the biggest websites in the UK the cheapest induction hob is £105 right now, and the cheapest ceramic hob is £80.

> They depend on the type of cookware used.

You can buy a pad from amazon for less than $10 that will let you use any cookware on an induction hob. Most cookware _is_ suitable (I bought a new pan before the holidays and even the cheapest non stick pans had a stainless steel layer on the bottom)

There's a reason 99% of people have non-stick aluminum cookware. Everything else is horrible, and I say that from bitter experience. How often do you scramble eggs on your cast iron skillet?

That said...

> can be acquired for under a hundred bucks.

You can certainly get a small set of non-stick aluminum cookware with induction plates built in for under $100, however, it's not the easiest thing to find in the first place.

Cooking on cast iron is great- you simply heat it on a low temp with some oil on the surface first, and scrambled eggs / ommelet is no problem.

It's pretty heavy to hold with one hand, but overtime I've gained stronger wrist strength and can handle it no problem now.

We're on our third non stick, but the cast iron is still going strong.

The rule is simple: those pans must never even be looked at by something metallic during use or cleaning. Wood or plastic are fine. I use wooden tools. Fingernails are not OK too.

Of course flatmates use to be quite anarchic and careless especially young ones.

I'll handwash more expensive wooden tools.

Other than heat retention, it’s as good if not better than cast iron in every way, and it’s way lighter to boot.

So I actually do cook scrambled eggs (and omelets) in a well seasoned carbon steel pan. I’ve made eggs fried over easy in my cast iron. It requires butter and the pan has to be the right temperature (it sticks more if you start too cold), but it’s doable.

It does stick a touch more than non-stick, but it’s not difficult to clean by any measure.

https://www.amazon.com/All-Clad-E785S264-Anodized-Nonstick-D...

Almost daily, through there are things one leearn. Butter is a must, especially in term of flavor, and if you fry bacon before then you need to let it cool down for a bit or the egg white will get bubbly.

I find the cultural aspect interesting. Non-stick teflon frying pans tend to degrade over time and as such, do not get passed down when people here move out. It was also not something that we used when I was young since they easily broke if misused. That is th part I suspect will change with time.

Maybe this is because induction hobs are much more common in Europe.

https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/annons-5-piece-cookware-set-gla...

And yes we make quite a lot of eggs, scrambled and fried, works just perfectly without a mess.

Onyx pans are amazing in every way (nonstick, scratchproof, dishwasher safe, induction ready) but not yet sold in the US I think: https://onyxcookware.de/

There are similar ones sold on AliExpress that would presumably ship to the US, e.g.: https://a.aliexpress.com/_mr49PaC

Every time I make scrambled eggs. It isn't difficult. I don't even see what you are getting at with this question.

I'm not sure who these people are that sit around and scheme about how to craft laws who fuck over people they'll never meet.

No one, they just don't consider that effects on peoples' lives. Sure, natural gas isn't great for indoor air quality, but it's easily mitigated by cracking a window or some airflow. Getting stuck with a cheap electric cook top makes cooking a lot more miserable and unreliable and there's nothing you can do to improve the situation if every apartment is built that way.

I suspect the average lawmaker does not take cooking seriously, which I think is fairly sad.

Some of that can probably be mitigated with good fume extraction, but it’s a consideration.

Uh, the air pollution of a typical urban street is a _disaster_.

The point about Julia Child is that she was creating works of art using this supposedly unusable tool. If she can manage that, your average Joe should be able to bang together some burgers and saute some vegetables on one.

Gas sure bets induction especially when filling up a large skillet with food. People can adopt though. It really wasn’t very long ago when cooking was mostly done with wood.

Personally I would just impose a tax on new hookups and more regulations before I actually banned gas though, but there is justification for government intervention when people are pumping highly flammable toxic and environmentally destructive gases into businesses and residences for the sake of making a better omelette.

The only really strong argument I see for gas is that reducing heating expenses has a substantial effect on local poverty.

[1] https://academic.oup.com/ije/article/42/6/1724/737113

I know that it's not Montana, but the vast majority of people aren't walking around in T-shirts in almost-freezing weather. These temperatures are pretty objectively cold, if you ask me.

FWIW, I've been to SF, but have never lived there. I am from (and currently live in) a much colder city. Even during summers where I've been to SF, I've experienced significant wind chills which have forced me to wear a hoodie.

That's still above freezing, which some may not consider "cold".

For example, even 'basic' heat pumps, the ones that look exactly the same as AC-only boxes, can typically work down to 5C. However once you drop down freezing and into the negatives (C) you tend to need mini-split systems. That's what the GP may mean when the word "cold" was used.

* https://www.fujitsugeneral.com/us/residential/what-is-a-mini...

> A single-zone (also called a mini-split) ductless system allows you to control the temperature of one room by connecting an outdoor unit to an indoor unit, with no ductwork needed. An outdoor mini-split unit is placed outside your home and is connected to an indoor mini-split unit by small cables and a refrigerant line through a hole in the wall.

* https://www.trane.com/residential/en/products/ductless-syste...

> A multi-zone (also called a multi-split) ductless system connects an outdoor unit to an one or more indoor units, letting you control the temperature in several different zones of your home. Variable Refrigerant Flow (VRF) systems are a type of multi-zone ductless systems. VRF systems are energy efficient, and they can be used to heat one zone while cooling a different zone at the same time.

* https://www.trane.com/residential/en/products/ductless-syste...

Why not? Most new construction is "luxury" priced, as since the land/structure is expensive anyway, and it's only marginally more expensive to put in "premium" appliances that allow you to charge a significant rent premium, everyone does that.

Of course new apartments are going to be built with induction cooktops when gas isn't an option. Induction isn't even that much more expensive.

They aren't luxury, they are market rate and the people renting them are often definitionally rent burdened.

> marginally more expensive to put in "premium" appliances

Induction cook tops cost nearly $4k. A whole electric stove and oven for about $600.

> since the land/structure is expensive anyway

In NYC you need an expected profit margin of 5% to get a development loan, and that quite high for large real estate projects. Slapping and extra $3-$4k onto each unit just isn't going to work for most projects.

> Of course new apartments are going to be built with induction cooktops when gas isn't an option.

As of today, there are fewer than 20 apartments for rent in NYC that list induction cooktops in their listings. I've checked every major rental site, and some didn't seem to actually have them based on photos. Plenty of building have electric, but I've never seen a rental with induction or heard of anyone who has one at any price of unit.

You are comparing a Tesla Model S to a Toyota Civic.

Here is a $500 36-inch induction cooktop

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Empava-36-in-Built-In-Electric-S...?

> Induction cook tops cost nearly $4k. A whole electric stove and oven for about $600. In NYC you need an expected profit margin of 5% to get a development loan, and that quite high for large real estate projects. Slapping and extra $3-$4k onto each unit just isn't going to work for most projects.

the cost of the cooktop and oven is not increasing by $3600. It's actually only increasing by $500.

Also 5% of a 800k condo unit is 40k.

Also your 5% profit margin is a bare minimum. In reality, I doubt any developer would do start any project unless they expected at minimum 15% margin.

I can buy 5 Miele induction cooktops for $4k, what planet are you living on?

While I agree with you the gas stove tops are better, electric ones work OK

Do you have a source for that? I have a gas stove, and so do many others I know, and I've never heard of a ban.

So the equipment itself is slightly more costly for an apartment, and a landlord specifically has a strong incentive to have little/no gas, to save on the annual checks.

Tldr; a tower block suffered a partial collapse as a result of a gas explosion in 1968. Changes to Building Regulations were made to mitigate against 'Disproportionate Collapse'

(Effect on legislation) 'Existing buildings were allowed to resist an explosive force of 17 kPa (2.5 psi), provided that the gas supply was removed and flats were refitted for electric cooking and heating.'

Such buildings with gas supplies today will have been constructed to comply with the amended regulations.

Also, in terms of resilience gas cooking beats electric cooking. In my experience (I live in an Eastern European capital city) gas delivery has been more constant compared to electric power, not to mention that even if both gas and electricity were to be cut off it's much easier to connect an existing gas cooktop to a small gas tank than it would be to connect an electric cooktop to an equivalent battery. In fact my parents still use gas tanks for part of their cooking (for the other part they use actual wood).

As for reliance on electric supply, I haven't experienced any outage longer than a couple of minutes since the 1980s, but I get that will certainly depend on where you live.

Meanwhile I've had gas boilers fail twice and had to resort to electric heaters while waiting for repairs.

Snow and ice storms are a reality that make self sufficiency highly desirable.

So I stand by what I said: Many places the power reliability is high enough. A long outage in Norway would be treated as a major national emergency.

I had no idea about the amount of leaking, but it makes sense. Unless you're actively checking every foot of gas pipe everywhere, chances are it's leaking here and there. But it's too bad. I learned while doing process control in a plant with steam heated processes, that you can run a lot of power down a gas pipe. I have a hunch that they could heat all of NYC from just waste heat.

The hob itself costs more, and the cheapest pans aren't compatible. Gas is often cheaper to run.

Other than initial purchase price, a normal electric hob has no advantages.

I'd say this is a bit of an overreaction. They're definitely terrible to time correctly, heat-wise. But they also can definitely cook. I've made a rib-eye steak medium rare just fine on a cast iron using reverse-sear between oven and the glass range.

The part I really hate is how careful I need to be not to damage the glass when using a heavy pan like that.

So, that would certainly seem to disprove their comment because I did in fact cook something, which implies it isn't useless.

If it doesn't have that...pass immediately

And as for cooking experience I prefer induction. It heats up the fastest and can control the heat just fine.

This regulation effects rental units, renters aren't going to swap ovens and cookware every-time they move house.

Here is a 30-inch Samsung induction cooktop for $1100

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Samsung-30-in-Smart-Induction-Mo...

> and another 500-1000 for induction cookware?

Here is a $43 induction cookware set which includes both pots and pans

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-8-Piece-Non-Stick-Kitche...

The cheap, government-controlled rentals in my town started switching to induction for all new cooktops a decade ago.

This is in Europe, though.

It's also, while good for the particular use cases it is aimed at, not great general substitute for a proper set of stovetop cookware.

But now that I'm living in California, electricity is so expensive and time-of-use so annoying that I can't imagine electrification unless I'm off-grid.

Where are you and how does the running cost compare?

I'm burning 5 therms a day to keep my interior at 16 C averaged over the last four weeks. Having intact exterior walls would probably help, but after two years I'm still waiting on local planners to give me permission to ask for permission to build.

I'm getting really close to bailing to someplace sensible.

What do you mean intact exterior walls? What do you have now?

In a high-renewables regime, there's the "duck curve" problem where renewable energy, especially solar power, is most abundant during the midday, whilst demand peaks in the early evening as lighting, heating or cooling loads (depending on season), and you guessed it, cooking loads come on-line.

If you arrive home at 17:30 and plan on eating within the half hour, you're using the most expensive electricity of the day.

That said, total cooking energy use isn't tremendously high (2--3 kW), and most heating tasks consume less than full output for well under an hour. You can operate a cooktop or oven at full heat for an hour for well under $1 unless rates are Texas-level high. That would be seriously atypical usage.

https://www.directenergy.com/learning-center/how-much-energy...

Taking advantage of lower midday rates would be possible with a crock-pot, slow-cooker, sous-vide, or similar methods, though that does require advanced planning and doesn't suit all cooking techniques.

Both loads are fairly modest in California compared to other parts of the US, though AC usage in the inland valleys may be high, and will likely be getting higher bye and bye.

Whole-house air filtration may also increasingly become A Thing.

Yes, the energy loads are fairly minimal. Though you'll have a blower, and either replaceable filters or electrostatic filters (themselves requiring an additional power draw).

Baking a loaf of bread would cost me $7 at current TOU peak. It's cheaper for me to buy one from the grocery store on energy costs alone, nevermind the material. That's craziness.

And even baseline rates in CA rise at 3-4x inflation. Maybe burning kerosene for lighting will become economically viable again.

Answer: per this solar axis[0], we average 242Wh/m² in January. Assuming 25% solar panel efficiency, this gives 60.5W/m². To get 12kw would require 200m² of solar panels, or 45"x45". If we covered our entire house with solar panels it'd be 80m²=4.8kW.

0. https://globalsolaratlas.info/detail?c=47.503287,-122.313538...

Heat pumps are 3-4 times as energy efficient as a gas furnace. However, PG&E charges 7-8x as much per kWh of energy in electricity form as it does in fossil gas form.

When you have your own solar and storage, it can be as cheap as $0.04-$0.07 for the solar. And depending on the storage vendor these days, it can be anywhere $0.05-$0.15 per kWh that gets stored and discharged. At those rates, it can be cheaper than gas.

This depends totally on the outside temperature. Larger, more expensive heat pumps can stay efficient down to lower temps. However, they all have a point where they become less efficient than resistive electric heat.

I'm in the process of electrifying in Brooklyn (Unrelated to this rule) and these common battery systems are terrifying if they catch fire.

I ended up with Enphase instead of Tesla Powerwalls primarily because the Enphase system supports direct generator integration, which allows smart generator use to offset the battery/solar system in a grid-off situation. The combo of batteries and genset makes for a very reliable scalable solution.

Is this really true, and do you have a source on this? Gas vehicles are extensively tested to ensure the integrity and safety of their gas tanks, even in extreme crashes, so I feel like the danger is actually very low.

I’m also curious what batteries you specifically used and how they are doing in terms of holding capacity after hundreds of cycles. Also, do you live in a cold location?

Gasoline in a car has a low risk of starting a fire, but a higher risk in the event of being exposed to a fire. Storing gasoline in a jerry can probably has higher risk of the first, and certainly the second.

Keep in mind both of these risks are much much lower than so many other things in your house that you do every day. Extension cords, faulty wiring, arcs, heaters, kitchen fires, etc.

I am using Enphase Encharge batteries, which are a LiFePO4 chemistry. They are in my garage, which is heated, so outdoor temperatures don'r make a difference. If they were outdoors, cold temperatures would be a problem below 0F, so if that is your situation I would only do an inside mount. I only have 20-30 cycles so far, but the cycle count is generally well regarded with this chemistry. Still, I don't expect these to last more than 15-20 years.

I am using the Enphase Encharge system, in which each battery unit also includes grid-creation capable micro-inverters. They are integrated into the same boxes, and can provide both grid offset, or grid generation. There is also a 'smart switch' that does the interconnects to the grid, and provides the autotransformer capability ( needed to have 120V split phase ).

There are some more details in my house/shop build thread on garage journal: https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/threads/jeffs-mountain-s...

Petrol inside a petrol tank inside a modern car is not the same risk as petrol sitting in a jerry can by the stove for another example.

Probably a good idea to install them somewhere that would be easy to flood with water if there was a problem though.

Don't try to be a hero and flood batteries from your 10 litres/minute faucet. Just get out before you inhale too much smoke, faint, and die.

[1] http://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/290443/ddg#29...

However dumping water on mass amounts of stored electricity sounds scary.

I read about a lot of places that require Powerwalls to be outside or have additional fire suppression for inside. Anyone have suggestions for what I can do given that I’ve got these guys installed? I haven’t found much help on how to protect myself there.

I can see why the fire department was concerned with these batteries: https://youtu.be/cTJh_bzI0QQ?t=344

In addition I upgraded the building envelope by air sealing it to high levels (1 ACH50 for building science nerds - close to th the Passive House standard) and installed an always-on heat recovery ventilation system.

The net effect is that the house uses 75% fewer total BTUs for heating than it used to when I had a gas fueled furnace.

In terms of operational cost, due to the 300%+ efficiency of the heat pump used to generate those BTUs, it results in a heating cost of roughly $100 (for roughly 400kWh) for the entire winter, vs the $500 (for roughly 250 therms) that I would spend on natural gas heat.

So on an absolute operational cost basis it's not much savings, since the climate is mild, but it's wildly more comfortable and my indoor allergies are a thing of the past.

You do realize that the 75% reduction is from your insulation improvements, not changing your furnace to a heatpump.

Given the current construction/remodeling costs it's not very cost effective to insulate. It's financially "better" to just burn more heat. Yes perhaps worse for the environment longer term but most people still make decisions based on direct costs not indirect environment.

Yes I realize that. In fact, I designed it that way to allow me to downsize the heat pump significantly.

> Given the current construction/remodeling costs it's not very cost effective to insulate. It's financially "better" to just burn more heat.

If you are undertaking a major home remodel that involves removing drywall, then it makes a lot of sense to upgrade the building envelope.

Short of that, there are also products like blown in wall insulation and Aerobarrier that can be done without a major renovation.

If you are changing the siding on your house, one should consider add a vapor permeable air barrier material to the outside.

Air sealing and (re)insulating unconditioned attic floors are another cost effective way to improve the building envelope performance.

Also, bear in mind that these sorts of improvements are investments in the longevity of the house, and also can create far greater comfort due to more consistent temperatures. Those things have a value also.

I should also mention that we have a 1BR apartment downstairs that we rent out, so this is usage for 2 households, each with electric kitchens, heat pumps, laundry, etc. Our usage would be lower without a tenant downstairs.

As for total costs, it's hard to say because so much of it was part of other major renovations to the house. We redid all the electrical in the house as part of that, which would normally not be necessary just to upgrade a couple of appliances. Things that might be necessary is upgrading your main electric panel to a higher capacity (going from 100a to 200a for example, which would cost around $8-10k). Cost of the appliances themselves are a big variable. Our main heat pump was $15k, but a lower model would have been more like $10k. The water heater was $2k (again, you could get a cheaper one).

Solar panels were installed in two systems a few years apart.

In 2017 my 6kw system cost $24,000 before any incentives (by SolarCity).

In 2020 my 7.8kw system cost $15,000 before any incentives (by Tesla).

After tax credits those two probably cost net <$30k.

The Tesla Powerwalls are being paid for entirely by the state of California SGIP program (which depending on your situation will cover about 30% or the full cost). Without that program they would have been in the $20k range.

Electrifying everything in a whole city will come with very expensive infrastructure changes. Especially if every house can also be a supplier so the amps can ramp up in different cables every time

(Also wow, your solar panels are expensive. Is that inc. Battery? I put down 4kw systems for about 3-4k 10x400wp panels)

Most sources I've looked at say heat pumps lose efficiency below 40F outdoor temperature and only work down to around -5F. If I were to convert to only using heat pumps, I'd have extremely inefficient or straight up intermittent heat and hot water for about a third of the year.

Falling back on resistive electric heating drives your heat bill through the roof.

I'd definitely love to get a heat pump for the other 8 months of the year, but the cost is hard to justify when I still need to maintain some other form of heat anyway.

How many kWh of gas were you using for heating in winter before the switch? How many kWh of electric do you use now?did you have to replace your radiators or add any extra insulation?

I’ve got a 1962 house with an oil boiler, currently using about 10 litres a day on heating, tempted to change to an air powered heat pump

I should add we are the benefactor of incredibly low grid rates (.11 per kWh) making the math workout very nicely.

The batteries are the backup. Keeping gas service "just in case" comes with it's own risks in terms of leaks, and where I live, with major earthquakes. Disconnecting it means I don't have to worry about that, or pay the $4/mo minimum to keep it active.

I believe this is the future we need if we're serious about eliminating CO2 emissions. It's not just power plants and cars - my house put out just as many emissions in the winter as my car did. Probably more. In a world where we're getting CO2 to zero there's no place for gas appliances. We need everyone to accept that, and it's going to take a while.

A typical 2500W electric burner is equivalent to about 8,500 BTU/hr.

The biggest gas burner on my decent Samsung range is 22,000 BTU/hr.

A high end wok jet ring burner typically found in restaurants (or in some people's homes who like to stir fry) can reach 160,000 BTU/hr.

You can't really get wok hei (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wok#Wok_hei) without that amount of heat and proper preparation & cooking technique.

my guess is, most people in most cooking situations would never need restaurant grade stove tops. but like we do now, us nerds with nerdy niche cases will figure out how to do it for ourselves with elaborate projects :p

This is not true at all. I have been cooking with my wok for years using induction. Only real requirement is that your wok has a flat bottom which while not 100% traditional works just fine.

You can cook food in a flat bottom frying pan on an induction cooktop, but you can’t do anything close to a traditional stir fry technique.

As for heat my 11kW induction top has never failed to keep any wok/pan hot enough for stir frying.

According to this convertor I found online https://www.stovesareus.co.uk/kilowatt-conversion it is roughly equilevant to a 37000 BTU/h burner.

And this was done to fit western stoves. It is not traditional and changes the method of cooking as well as heat distribution. Woks need round bottoms.

The issue is that the lower voltage ~115 requires higher currents (over twice) which translates to more copper everywhere, beefer silicon for SMPS converters that are even used for induction tops.

Much cheaper to put a nice electric induction cooktop into every kitchen than to run gas onto every floor.

can you be more specific here? What sort of things would other readers interested in electrifying a house not be considering?

What I had in mind with the comment above though is that it's just a shift in mindset. In the past I had no idea what a 'therm' of gas was, or how much that was, or any way to connect "run the heater for an hour" to a unit of energy or cost. With everything electric, and everything monitored in detail, and production of electricity on the roof, now everything in the house is on the same unit of energy which I can at least wrap my head around. I can connect "run the heater for an hour (3.5kwh)" to "2 hours of shaded solar power" or "a whole day of hot water" or "a 10 mile trip to the shops in the car". With data comes awareness, and with awareness its inevitable that you'll shift your behavior to be more efficient.

- Is your house wired for the load? (e.g. you need bigger wires to handle the higher amperage. Walls might need to be taken down in order to rewire the appliances)

Those are the two biggest issues. Depending on your house layout, you might basically need to gut your entire house just to rewire a single appliance. I'm obviously throwing out a catastrophic example here, but it can happen. This sort of thing is best done if you're doing major renovations anyway.

This is simply not true. Any decent electrician will be able to fish the lines with a few strategically placed small holes.

I do agree though that the average house would not require gutting to wire an appliance.

Worst case, you have an insulated wall that you need to tear apart. For pre ‘78 houses, do a lead and asbestos inspection before starting work. You would have to tear down drywall/rocklath, tear out insulation, cut holes in the studs for wires, put up new insulation, new drywall, and mud/paint the walls. You could do that in a weekend assuming you have the materials and tools starting Saturday morning.

Looking forward to a reply by op because I suspect their house is above 200amps because of the appliances and cars they have.

It doesn't matter if I have 1 GW of solar and batteries and EVs and the whole grid is converted to renewables and I only eat vegan from my own back yard, etc. If my home furnace runs on gas it's emitting CO2 to run. There was literally an exhaust pipe running out the side of my house for the furnace, water heater, etc. The only way to eliminate those emissions is to eliminate the appliance.

I don't know what the break even cost on all this stuff is, because I frankly don't care. I did do the math on the heat pump water heater vs. what we were paying for the gas water heater (there was a time where the water heater was the only gas thing running), and the new water heater saved us about $30/mo in energy costs just comparing gas to electric. And with solar panels the savings over a gas heater are even greater. I figure break even on a very high end water heater is <4 years.

[edits because I mixed up answers to another comment]

Switching to zero-emissions alternatives now means less adjustment later when the polluting versions are (hopefully inevitably) banned.

“At scale, nobody notices the harm I’m doing” can be used to justify all manner of antisocial behavior. I don’t buy the argument.

I don't think this follows. There's not THAT much that goes into making a furnace, but it emits a hell of a lot of emissions every year that it's running. I suspect they paid back the CO2 cost of the new equipment relatively quickly.

Electric is cool but I’m not tribal about it. We should all use what makes sense, in some cases that’s gas.

We also don't have prolonged winter outages here since there's no snow (coastal california). If that was a common problem I might strategize a little differently or have gas as an emergency backup.

It's certainly very nice to have gas even when power is out. Means I can cook just fine on the gas range, the water heater is working so I still have warm showers.

And, while I haven't done this too often, I can run the house heater fan off a small generator, it doesn't take that much power. So I can even heat the house when needed if power is out, with the gas furnace.

Or do you not care because you’ve installed massive batteries?

Conversely, this time of year (winter) the way our house is positioned with the sun (on a hill, surrounded by tall trees) we generate a pretty small amount of solar, and are running the heaters a lot, so very grid dependent. The batteries would power the house for maybe 12 hours in an outage.

Last summer I'd often charge a car during the day instead of at night because we were generating more than the draw of the EV charger. I have an internal debate about whether this is better, because the power company's time-of-use structure incentivizes me to not do this, but instead export the power to the grid. So I'm not actually sure whether maximizing my energy usage at the time of production is less carbon intensive than exporting it to offset the rest of the community's usage. I guess it all depends on what's generating that grid energy at night.

For the most part within the house though, the batteries let you not care too much about what energy you're using when.

For Helsinki they are moving to heat pumps for the district heating as they want to close the 2 remaining coal plants in the next couple years.

Also, the % of people who live in climates like yours is relatively small, so everyone who doesn't live in those places should not be using this as an excuse for inaction.

Burning trees typically creates an enormous quantity of particulates.

I guess someone should tell Norway that their residents don't really exist

Cities will always require the import of significant materials, food, and energy from surrounding areas, and electricity is actually a more efficient means of importing energy than natural gas is. Replacing all the diesel trucks and buses with electrical versions, that's equally desirable. Cities will become much cleaner places, which is to everyone's benefit.

However, there are some fascinating cases that work: https://www.stuytown.com/sustainability/solar This project is almost complete and seems to be working really well.

1 - https://youtu.be/GhAKMAcmJFg

Despite the many faults with this video, the person actually mentions the efficiency of heat pumps, which are WAY higher than the efficiency of fuel burners.

> Are you not bothered by all the noise it generates?

Modern inverter based heat pumps are incredibly quiet.

> Why not just use electric heater instead of a heat pump?

Because 100% efficiency is way worse than 300-500% efficiency (i.e. the coefficient of performance of an air source heat pump).

This video is mostly talking about "air to water" heat pumps, in other words, replacing a traditional fuel fired hydronic system with a heat pump. This is not an ideal use for heat pumps. Typical hydronic systems are designed for high water temps, which means replacing directly with heat pumps will not work.

This person's argument is summed up as "we have horribly built houses and we should never improve them, so let's just overheat them so they feel comfortable". Oh and "there's a conspiracy to artificially raise the price of gas to trick us into buying heat pumps".

I've had this video on in the background. It's some amazing fear mongering.