Yesterday the Daily Post and the DJ both had front page pieces about the Bay Area Air Board meeting that County Supe Ray Mueller walked out after twenty minutes. The meeting was closely watched by a number of constituencies as the original plan was to ban new and replacement gas water heaters come January. Mueller felt “boxed in” because the staff only offered two options–stick with the January 2027 deadline or extend a year to January 2028. No option to just dump the idea altogether. He feels the cost estimates are vague. He noted “I don’t think you can move forward with rulemaking that is going to put costs on consumers when you haven’t done a fair assessment of what those costs are”. Lately they gave been throwing around the number $3,500–supposedly $600 to $1,600 more than a replacement water heater. In a lot of cases, that is just laughable.

We touched on some of the issues here and in 2020 here. The more we learn by talking to real plumbers, electricians, and general contractors, the more ridiculous this ban is revealed to be. For example, HVAC guys will tell you that an electric heat pump gets its heat from the air space around it so if you have a water heater indoors, like a service porch or closet, it’s taking living space heat to heat water if you even have enough ambient temperature to make it “efficient”.

Nibbling around the edges by saying people can get an exemption for this or that ignores the time and energy wasted on dealing with a bureaucracy. And saying if one is low-income, they get an exception feels like a “stick it to the middle class” moment. The Board sans Mueller voted to push the deadline out to January 2028 so if you like your current system you can painlessly replace it for another 13 months. Kudos to Ray Mueller for a flash or realism.