In the 1920s, oil was an innovative new way to heat homes, a vast improvement over dusty, labor-intensive coal. Much of the housing stock in my district, including my own home, was built during a period when fossil fuels were cheap and plentiful. Now, in the 2020s, oil is definitely not cheap, but many people in my community are still forced to fill aging boilers with delivered fuels to heat their homes.
Heat pumps are a much cleaner and less expensive alternative to oil heating, but the cost of the transition can be prohibitive for many families. Ironically, cost locks these households into using a more expensive form of energy. My legislation, A.7060, would authorize NYSERDA to offer grants and low-cost financing specifically to help households make the switch from delivered fuels to heat pumps. The program is simple, targeted, and long overdue.
If we are serious about wanting to address affordability and sustainability, we need to deal with the fact that New York consumes more heating oil than any other state in the country. This is a major liability for more than 1.8 million households across the state, facing volatile home energy costs that spike with every international crisis. This is also another instance where the environmentally friendly choice is also the economically friendly choice. Helping households make the switch would enable the overwhelming majority of them (98%) to save money – an average of $1,451 per year.
Beyond the dollars, the environmental case is compelling. Electrifying homes that rely on delivered fuels is the single highest-impact action we can take toward decarbonization in New York State. Replacing oil or propane furnaces with heat pumps eliminates 34 to 55 percent more carbon pollution than switching the same number of natural gas furnaces. When it comes to eliminating emissions, this is low-hanging fruit, sitting in the basements of nearly two million homes.
Personally, I have transitioned my 1920s home off natural gas as each appliance broke. Having subsidies in place not only helped me make the transition, but now with air source heat pumps I have air conditioning and am able to reduce the moisture in my home during the ever hotter and more humid summer months. New Yorkers who are currently stuck on delivered fuels deserve the same opportunity that I had to receive assistance transitioning their homes, and we will all be better off if we make this opportunity available to them.
This program would not require new funds, simply an authorization to allow NYSERDA to use funding we have already allocated for this purpose. Every year we delay is another year families pay $1,400 they don’t have to, another year of unnecessary emissions, another year we fall further behind on commitments we’ve made to our constituents and to the planet. Let’s get this done in the waning days of this legislative session.
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