Right now in California natural gas is about $14-15 per thousand cubic feet (yeah it’s a stupid unit), which is about 1 million BTUs (another stupid unit of energy). That translates to about 290 kWh.
The average residential price of electricity in California is about 30 cents per kWh. So the same amount of energy in electricity would be about $87, about 5.8 times as expensive as gas per unit energy.
If a heat pump is 4 times as efficient at heating than a gas furnace, then we’re still looking at higher heating costs for heating a home.
And things like stoves and hot water heaters tend not to be as efficient as heat pumps, so you’re still looking at a 4-6x cost difference from electrification on those.
Natural gas is abundant and cheap in North America, and transporting gas overseas has always been inefficient and expensive, so each continent tends to have their own price for natural gas.
Electricity is expensive in California in large part because the transmission lines cause devastating wildfires, so the rates now includes the cost of preventing fires by continuously trimming trees and other vegetation near power lines, and paying off past liability for billions of damage in previous fires.
Right now in California natural gas is about $14-15 per thousand cubic feet (yeah it’s a stupid unit), which is about 1 million BTUs (another stupid unit of energy). That translates to about 290 kWh.
The average residential price of electricity in California is about 30 cents per kWh. So the same amount of energy in electricity would be about $87, about 5.8 times as expensive as gas per unit energy.
If a heat pump is 4 times as efficient at heating than a gas furnace, then we’re still looking at higher heating costs for heating a home.
And things like stoves and hot water heaters tend not to be as efficient as heat pumps, so you’re still looking at a 4-6x cost difference from electrification on those.
Yeesh! It’s crazy that gas is so much cheaper in a place with such abundant sunlight- any idea why? Are there lopsided grants/funding?
Natural gas is abundant and cheap in North America, and transporting gas overseas has always been inefficient and expensive, so each continent tends to have their own price for natural gas.
Electricity is expensive in California in large part because the transmission lines cause devastating wildfires, so the rates now includes the cost of preventing fires by continuously trimming trees and other vegetation near power lines, and paying off past liability for billions of damage in previous fires.