Sacramento City Hall. (Photo: cityofsacramento.org)
City of Sacramento’s Sneaky All-Electrification Plan of Existing Buildings and Homes
This is not affordable, reliable, sustainable or desirable
By Katy Grimes, December 15, 2023 9:12 am
The City of Sacramento is developing a plan to electrify every building in the city to create an all-electric city – under the guise of its “Climate Action and Adaptation Plan” that details “the City’s efforts to support the State goal of carbon neutrality by 2045.”
That’s a bureaucratic way of saying we’re taking your gas stove and gas heater away – for your own good.
“The Strategy reflects Climate Action and Adaptation Plan direction and early implementation…” the city says. “The City’s 2016 GHG Inventory identified buildings as contributing 37 percent of total emissions citywide, making it a critical sector for decarbonization.”
“Decarbonization.” Think about that. Decarbonization means phasing out the fossil fuels that now provide over 80% of all the energy we use – in favor of unreliable and intermittent wind, solar and other “renewable” energy sources. Leftists claim “Decarbonization is the six-syllable term that sums up what’s needed to put the brakes on human-induced climate change.”
CO2 is necessary for life as Physicist Dr. Ralph Alexander explains at Climate Depot:
Plants are essential for life because they are the source, either directly or indirectly, of all the food that living creatures eat. Both CO2 and water, as well as sunlight, are necessary for the photosynthesis process by which plants grow. In the carbon cycle, the ultimate repository for CO2 pulled out of both the air and the oceans is limestone or calcium carbonate (CaCO3), of which there are two types: chemical and biological.
Sacramento’s “New Building Electrification Ordinance that was adopted by the Sacramento City Council in June 2021 and readopted in alignment with the 2023 California Building Standards Code in November 2022. The Ordinance took effect in January 2023.”
I don’t recall voting on this – because we did not. This is a case of politicians assuming they know what is best for us, rather than asking the people how we want to live. And, there is always some backroom graft and corruption involved.
The Globe has reported extensively on California Democrat politicians’ push to ban gas appliances in homes and businesses in California – even as the state cannot currently or consistently keep the power on. Utilities now shut power off during windy days, rain storms, snow storms and triple digit heat.
Even in the face of inconsistent available electricity, as well as shortages, the City of Sacramento is moving full speed ahead to eventually cripple the city with single source energy – electricity – for our homes.
The result will be those who can afford to will leave Sacramento, and those who cannot will be forced into abandoning their cars and gas stoves, and will have to live near public transportation. This is one way to turn the Capitol City into billionaire oligarch’s evil 15-Minute Cities – “The idea essentially is to re-invent the neighborhood idea by trying to ensure that pretty much all of the goods and services a person could ever want are readily available nearby. Jobs, schools, doctors, and cultural activities are also meant to be easily accessible,” the Globe reported on what a 15-minute city is. “To get to the ’15 minute’ part, the area would be (based on typical walking speeds) about a square mile or so.” However, these are “oppressively top-down systems that shift power of ones’ community to the bureaucrat class and intentionally and egregiously ignore same basic facts about how humans act and how a beautiful city like Boston – very very very much not by design – got to be that way.”
Notably, “An unprecedented level of public incentives for electrification will be available starting in 2023,” the city electrification document admits.
Coincidentally, “on April 28, 2021, SMUD’s Board of Directors adopted the 2030 Zero Carbon Plan, which establishes the commitment to zero carbon for SMUD’s energy resources by 2030.”
“In June 2021, City Council adopted Resolution 2021-0166,33 directing staff to develop a strategy to transition existing buildings to all-electric by 2045.”
Collusion, anyone?
The city document is quite long but reading the footnotes is telling. First, the document and plan was developed “In Consultation With: Rincon Consultants, Inc. – environmental consultants, and Vistar Energy, Inc. – which “Provides electricity and natural gas to homes and businesses in over 10 states.”
In January of 2022, the Globe reported that California is pushing to become the first state to ban natural gas heaters, water heaters, and furnaces by 2030, a policy of the California Air Resources Board, entirely made up of appointees by the governor.
One of the footnotes references the Rocky Mountain Institute, “a 501(c)3 nonprofit aiming to radically improve America’s energy practices.” The City of Sacramento isn’t using science, but is referencing propaganda.
The carbon free buildings program at Rocky Mountain Institute states:
We Must:
Construct only zero-carbon buildings
Retrofit 5% of buildings annually
Ensure electric and efficient appliances
Rocky Mountain Institute claims they are: “Driving the technical, policy, and regulatory solutions to accelerate the transition to all-electric buildings.”
The City’s all-electrification plan says “The City of Sacramento participated in the California Equitable Home Electrification Program, a learning cohort convened by RMI and the Emerald Cities Collaborative.”
You can begin to see how this attempt to ban natural gas stoves started. Their agenda is huge.
Rocky Mountain Institute proposes “carbon-free buildings.” They say, “Commercial buildings consume more than 35 percent of the generated electricity in the U.S. and are underperforming at every level. They waste energy, emit too much carbon, and are too costly for owners and occupants.”
Under the Rocky Mountain Institute RMI Carbon-free Electricity program, they say:
We Must:
Scale clean energy portfolios
Build clean, competitive, modern grids
Make utilities clean energy champions
Natural gas does not fit into this model.
Even more disturbing is the World Health Organization is named in the studies, as are many Chinese studies.
The City document reports that “in September 2022 the California Public Utilities Commission voted unanimously to eliminate subsidies for new gas line extensions beginning in July 2023. In addition, the CPUC adopted a new framework in December 2022 to plan for maintenance and retirement of gas distribution infrastructure.”
This should freeze your insides.
Also in September 2022, the California Air Resources Board released their 2022 State Implementation Plan Strategy, which includes a zero-emissions standard for space and water heating appliances beginning in 2030 to prohibit the sale of space and water heating appliances that emit GHGs in the state of California. “Once implemented, this regulation would be extremely supportive of building electrification at the local level.”
All of this was decided out of the public eye by unelected bureaucrats – for your own good.
It’s necessary and for your own good because the City of Sacramento wants to create:
- Healthy Communities
- Energy Affordability
- Just transition through the creation of high-quality local jobs
- Greenhouse Gas Reductions
The City of Sacramento electrification document reads like a Diversity, Equity and Inclusive game plan: “The Effectiveness Criteria were used in addition to the Equity Criteria to make sure that the benefits of electrification can be fully realized while avoiding negative impacts on other City priorities and projects, as well as on residents and business owners.”
Most countries around the world think that it’s a good thing to have cheap energy. In California, we have plenty of cheap energy available, just not the political will to access it.
California depends on natural gas-driven turbines and hydroelectric generators to provide just 38 percent of its energy needs.
The state imports 12 percent of its oil from Alaska, and another 58 percent from foreign nations, relying heavily on Canada, which has 19 commercial nuclear reactors and is the world’s third-largest producer of hydroelectricity.
The state is awash in ultra-cheap natural gas, yet in California, our corrupt government finds ways to create an energy shortage, and charge ratepayers the highest rates in the country.
This is one reason California electricity costs more than twice the national median—thanks to a government-created shortage.
California’s natural gas shale formation is one of the largest in the world. And, California has been a pioneer in renewable energy, albeit still unreliable and unproven.
While California sits on one of the largest known deposits of recoverable oil and gas, production has steadily fallen.
The state ignores its vast onshore and offshore deposits, which are fully accessible through conventional and hydraulic fracturing technologies.
Another reason is that the California Public Utilities Commission, the state’s energy “regulator,” has a historic, dubious relationship with Wall Street, making promises to keep the profits higher of the state’s publicly held utilities, than utility profits elsewhere.
California politicians have gloated over being the first state to enact such aggressive green energy and greenhouse gas busting policy, but have yet to produce any proof that these oppressive and business-killing laws have had any “green” results.
All while they ignore that natural gas is clean, less expensive to extract, natural and abundant. It wasn’t that long ago that natural gas used to be the left’s preferred alternative to all other “dirty fuels.”
But as the oil and gas industry found better, more affordable ways to access natural gas, it fell out of favor with emotional, whimsical environmentalists, and corrupt politicians.
Every which way that ratepayers turn, we are getting seriously bilked by the politicians in this state – including the City of Sacramento.
Read the City of Sacramento EXISTING BUILDING ELECTRIFICATION STRATEGY – and weep. This is not affordable, reliable, sustainable or desirable.
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I don’t for a second think anyone of these idiots downtown in the capitol or at city hall are so damn smart and so damn sure of themselves that this is the right decision. They are all puppets. Told what to think and say and thats why they are so sure of themselves. The don’t question, they just listen to their masters and repeat it as gospel.
May God have mercy on their souls for they know not what they have done.
Have mercy on their souls? The deep-state Democrat/RINO uniparty stooges who are implementing this nightmare scenario have sold their souls to the dark side and they’re beyond redemption?
You’re right, I’m way too kind.
So those who are unable to escape the Democrat’s hellish 15 minute City of Sacramento will be forced into abandoning their gas vehicles, gas stoves, gas heaters, etc. and they’ll l have to live near public transportation if they want to get around–no doubt after obtaining permission to travel from their Democrat overlords? No doubt state, county and local officials and those connected with the Democrat criminal cabal will be hauled around in private limos paid by for taxpayers wherever and whenever they please? No doubt they’ll also be able to continue to have gas appliances much like New York’s Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul has gas stoves in the governor’s mansion and in her other residences while banning them for the rest of the state?
For your own good? NOPE! Everything they do is for your detriment and it is always by design. The elites in Sacramento believe YOU are not sustainable and they want you gone.
As Katy Grimes said, “This is not affordable, reliable, sustainable or desirable.” Nor is it POSSIBLE, as she didn’t include in that quotable line but did reference in her article. It CANNOT be implemented, even if it were affordable, which it is not, at least it can never be fully implemented. And why oh why would anyone WANT to, when the result would be devastating and most would suffer, starve, freeze, and probably die if they stood still for it?
Thus as usual this is sheer malevolence. These people are not right in the head or are simply evil, or both. Their main goal seems to be an attempt to create paralyzing fear and anxiety in the population from knowing this is what our “leaders” want to constantly shove down our throats, in the ‘whether-you-like-it-or-not’ style we’ve become accustomed to. We know they have no intention of improving ANYTHING or making ANYTHING better. How can they when they are programmed for destruction?
At what point are we going to start digging into the CARB board more? The name comes up from time to time, but there is rarely much interest or discussion in the unelected board with extreme levels of control over our lives and finances.
Take a look at the SMUD plan too:
https://www.smud.org/en/Corporate/Environmental-Leadership/2030-Clean-Energy-Vision
Here’s a passage from SMUD’s “Clean Energy Vision” 2030 Zero Carbon Plan (maybe picture Napolean from Animal Farm explaining the plan):
“Going absolute zero carbon is a bold and ambitious goal — one we believe we can and must
achieve. We can’t get there with today’s technology and we can’t get there alone.”
Good luck comrade.
Don’t these people know that ‘net zero’ programs such as they describe here most often result in global increases in emissions? First there is the result of ‘leakage’. Next is the effect on grid operations due to intermittency and the need for balancing.
Then of course is the issue that these policies damn children in the Congo and elsewhere to a ife of slavery working in the mines.
Turning electric into heat is the most inefficient use of electricity there is.
Lastly, how much underground natural gas does California have?