Will those in the southern states cope? Could you switch?
We built our house specifically to not have mains gas. Large double-glazed picture windows on the north side of the house, Solar and a Battery, decent insulation. Large capacity reverse cycle A/C with the condensers on the south side of the house.
The a week before handover, the Site Supervisor told us that they ‘mistakenly’ budgeted for “electrical assist” hot water instead of full electric. They would need to add Gas, but they would pay for the connection. We argued with them. They argued back. It escalated all the way to the CEO of the Building Company. The Site Supervisor kept insisting that it was impossible to have full electric hot water, that is was cost-prohibitive to install, cost-prohibitive to run and anyone who would not want gas hot water was a fucking idiot. The CEO explained to the Site Supervisor that his own house had Full electric, two Tesla Power-walls and an extensive solar array and hadn’t had to pay for Gas or Electricity since it was built. He then calmly fired the Site Supervisor and instructed the Regional Manager to authorise the Full electric hot water with no extra charge to us.
This is a crazy story. Most houses in northern Australia have full electric hot water. Very rare to have town gas and bottles is often painful.
We had all sorts of problems with the build. It had minimal to do with the company and everything to do with the Site Supervisors(s).
Another example was the Colourbond roof. We specifically wanted a light colour (to reflect heat in summer), with Woodland Grey gutters (to contrast with the roof and complement the render). We turned up one night after work and they had done the whole roof in Woodland Grey. We pointed out this observation and found out that the Site Supervidor had changed the purchase order because he “thought that Woodland Grey would look better”.
His suggested remedy was to repaint the roof and even came into my workplace during work hours to try to con me into authorise the incorrect roof colour.
In the end they had to tear down the Woodland Grey and re-clad in Surf Mist.
In the house that I’m renting it would mean replacing the gas hot water system and the stove.
That’s not going to happen unless a law is passed forcing the owner to do so.
Usually these sorts of things have a carrot and stick approach.
The carrot is usually a trade-up program offering rebates on a new/replacement model.
The stick is gas prices - you just turn the dial up until its too hot to bear (pun intended).
I had to replace my hot water system a while back and was interested in changing gas to electric, but plumbers I talked to all tried to disuade me from it. In the end I changed from the existing large storage tank system which was here when I moved in and which was massively innefficient for the usage required. I didn’t want another system that was heating up a big tank of water all the time for no reason, and also was under time pressure with no working hot water, so switched to an instantaneous gas system which has cut gas use by a huge amount (perhaps 25% of what it was), so this at least a more efficient system for now but it’s put off getting rid of gas for a good few years. The only other gas appliance I have is a heater which is rarely used, cooking is electric.
It’s so interesting reading different opinions.
This article posted recently to Lemmy states that a large storage tank is a good thing.
Yep, I have a new shiny gas instantaneous hot water and was originally irritated at myself as, unlike you, I didn’t even consider an electric at the time of replacement (doh!)
But my gas has dropped drastically. My only Irritation with this now is the supply fees don’t change here even if you use less.
another system that was heating up a big tank of water all the time for no reason
Shouldn’t a larger system be, in at least some ways, more efficient? Since volume scales by r^3 and surface area by r^(2), a larger tank loses less of its heat to the environment.
I guess it’s efficient in heating up a certain amount of water but the problem is that it was heating up far more water than I was ever using. The insulation of the tank keeps it warm to an extent, but the massive cut in gas usage suggests it was doing a lot of heating for nothing. The new one is efficient in the sense that it only heats what I need and has cut my gas usage.
Here in WA, the focus needs to be on getting the power grid under control. There is currently not enough gas power generation… resulting in dirty diesel generators being spun up.
Given the WA grid can’t handle current power demands, I don’t think we’ll be in a position to disconnect household gas for quite some time ☹
