10 resources to get off gas – as the tipping point looms
By Tim Forcey
With thanks to the Fifth Estate who first published this article by Tim.
Australians have been active for years in an effort to de-gas and electrify our homes, improve their comfort, environmental performance and our health, while at the same time reducing the cost of living and saving householders up to thousands of dollars per year. With some recent good news, can we be excused for thinking we’ve reached a tipping point?
As the declining fossil-gas industry ramps up its final efforts to thwart progress (such as by suggesting we sit on our hands pretending heat pumps don’t exist while waiting around for expensive hydrogen), I suppose this confirms our movement is winning.
We’ve already seen a drop-off in the amount of gas we burn each year, and I expect next year we’ll see this declining trend accelerate.
Positive accomplishments
At first it was the progressive government of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) announcing a ban on connecting new homes to the gas grid. Further, the ACT plans to be totally gas free by 2045.
But one could say the ACT’s leadership has been eclipsed with the Victorian government announcing a similar ban. This is remarkable for a couple of reasons. Victoria is Australia’s second most populous state, 15 times larger than the ACT. Over a quarter of all Australians live in Victoria. So, bans on connecting new homes to the gas grid will soon cover over a quarter of the Australian population.
Victoria has also, for more than 60 years and more than in any other state, disposed of cheap, locally-produced Bass Strait gas by burning it inefficiently in our homes. But now, as Bass Strait gas production plummets and as the advantages of heat pumps and induction cooktops become widely known, it makes sense that Victorian homes now give the gas habit a swift kick.
How long it takes for other state governments to also protect their home-buyers from having to accept a builder’s default offer — expensive gas-fired heating and unhealthy gas cooking — is anyone’s guess.
The New South Wales government seems not to want to get involved, and this has led some NSW councils to talk of gas-connection bans, including Waverley, Parramatta, and the City of Sydney.
What is hydrogen good for?
In South Australia, commentators say the state government has swallowed the fossil-gas industry’s hydrogen “Kool-Aid”, bedazzled by a trial where 3 per cent of the gas flowing to a small number of homes is now expensive hydrogen. Going beyond this tiny fraction would require a prohibitively costly re-work of gas supply pipes and equipment and of all the appliances in peoples’ homes.
Meanwhile businesses such as Adelaide Heat Pumps post every day how they’ve removed another inefficient gas or resistive-electric hot water service. Their customers aren’t waiting around for hydrogen.
In Western Australia also, the idea of hydrogen had been used to delay home electrification. But now a WA gas distributor has cancelled a small hydrogen project. The state environment minister has come to recognise that “electricity is cheaper and healthier; we know that in years to come we want to walk away from gas”.
Setting a positive example is Esperance, where the expensive gas distribution system was completely shut down in favour of electrification, not hydrogen.
And in a remarkable turnaround, a former Australian chief scientist, Alan Finkel, who once produced a report supporting widespread use of hydrogen, now admits that hydrogen can’t be a cost effective option for our homes.
This informed view aligns with dozens of studies across the world that have all concluded green hydrogen will certainly be useful in industry, but not in homes.
Gas distributors reveal they’ve entered the “wind-up” phase.
Gas distributors ‘talk a good game’, claiming they’ll one day devise an honest way to contribute to a green future. But when it comes to the hard dollar numbers, they have now entered the wind-up phase. They’ve asked the regulator to approve tens of millions of dollars of expenditure in order to deal with the increasing number of households having their gas metres hauled away. The gas-grid death spiral has finally begun.
Going all-in on informing Australians about the benefits of electrification
To counter the gas industry’s misinformation many other groups, businesses, and individuals are going all-in, seeking to thoroughly inform the public about the benefits of getting the gas out of homes. These include volunteer-led community groups, progressive media outlets, not-for-profits, local councils, and community leaders.
Online publications and resources
The Fifth Estate has just concluded the Festival of Electric Ideas Masterclass focusing on the electrification of commercial buildings and precincts. Recordings are available here
Several years ago the Australian Capital Territory Conservation Council launched the Make the Switch website, complete with a calculator showing how much money Canberra residents could save by ditching gas.
Energy Tips, created by Geelong Sustainability (VIC), is an extensively useful website containing how-to information and videos covering complete home electrification as well as comfort and efficiency improvements.
The not-for-profit Renew has prepared a Getting Off Gas Toolkit for householders, which includes webinar recordings.
Renew Economy has launched Switched On, an online resource with podcasts, explainers, and articles.
Friends of the Earth has launched a website where Victorians can pledge to get their homes off gas and find information about how to do that.
Environment Victoria’s Getting Off Gas website explains the rebates available to Victorians and other tips.
Momentum Energy (owned by Hydro Tasmania) sells gas to Victorian homes, but has — somewhat surprisingly — published a great list of top tips online that recommends homes get off gas.
The team managing the Residential Efficiency Scorecard has realised that householders’ desires to electrify their homes may be a reason to access the services of a Scorecard assessor, thus this promotional animated video.
The Climate Council, Grattan Institute, Renew, Environment Victoria, Energy Consumers Australia, and the Australian Sustainable Built Environment Council (ASBEC) have all published reports in recent months highlighting the benefits of getting gas out of homes. These reports have been attracting a steady level of media attention.
This is only a partial list of information sources, based on what is happening in Victoria.
100,000 MEEH members and growing
The stars continue to align, with the Facebook group My Efficient Electric Home (MEEH) now surpassing 100,000 members, with more than 200 new members rushing in on some days.
We’ve stacked up thousands of case studies; thousands of homes where people are saving up to thousands of dollars per year by switching off gas, switching on solar PV panels and heat pumps, draught-proofing, insulating, properly dressing windows, and more.
Mainstream media outlets often come to MEEH looking for examples of people improving their homes, as have academics looking for input to a scholarly study
A big thanks to current and past administrators, including my friend and diligent colleague Richard Keech who has been there nearly from the beginning.
Thanks also to the members who, time and time again, chip in with knowledgeable answers. And thanks also to those members who have simply asked a question. All questions are good questions at MEEH.
MEEH has helped lots of people. Beyond that, the group helps me to feel we are making a difference and has professionally helped me keep in touch day-by-day with what is happening in the home comfort and energy space.
And a final thanks to my guru Alan Pears, AM, who has been such a hard-working leader in Australian energy efficiency for several decades and remains so still today.
I started MEEH in June 2015 and after about a year the membership roughly doubled each year thereafter. Will we say hello to 200,000 members in 2024? To help stabilise our climate, we need to get the gas out of the millions of remaining Australian homes as quickly as we can.
Volunteer-led community groups
With inspiration from local resident and electrification guru Saul Griffith, founder of Rewiring Australia, Electrify 2515 seeks to electrify that Illawarra region (NSW) postcode of 2515 and provide inspiration and how-to knowledge to others.
In the Kew suburb of Melbourne, the volunteer-led group Electrify Boroondara will launch with an expo on 8 October 2023.
Geelong Sustainability has further partnered with local suppliers and launched www.ElectricHomes.com.au as a way to accelerate household involvement in that region.
Local councils showing how residents can take action
Merri-Bek Council in Melbourne has for some time featured a website with tips and case studies describing electrification journeys already taken by residents.
There are at least 23 other councils across Victoria with similar electrification / climate emergency aims, such as Banyule, Darebin, Glen Eira, and Yarra. Even my own local council in so-called conservative Bayside (Melbourne) has launched the Love Bayside – Electrify Everything campaign.
The City of Adelaide assists residents to develop and all-electric home plan.
Influencing governments
Though it’s less than the full climate emergency action needed, in response to community actions the Australian government’s $1.5 billion support package “to speed up energy efficiency and electrification in key sectors of the economy, including buildings”, was welcomed by the Property Council of Australia. And the Australian Senate is holding an enquiry into the benefits of residential electrification.
Twenty-three organisations across the energy, social service and health sectors for instance, have written to the Victorian Government requesting that existing homes be urgently assisted to go all-electric.
Individual MPs have also publicly declared their own homes will be electrified.
My own representative Zoe Daniel has taken steps to electrify her family’s home. Daniel has also published podcasts and newsletters with electrification tips for residents of our electorate and as well as organising a well-attended community energy efficiency expo.
Victoria’s state Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio has made her Brunswick home all-electric.
Small business response – clever plumbers and electricians
Across Australia, we’re seeing small businesses spring up to help households get the gas out, sometimes offering a one-stop shop. Some go by clever names such as “Good-bye Gas”, “Pure-Electric”, “All-Electric Homes”, “Energy Freedom Homes”, “The Energy Efficiency and Electrification Alliance”, or “Want A Heat Pump”.
These entrepreneurs realise we urgently need to get the gas out of hundreds of homes every working day from now until 2030 or 2040 or whatever deadline we set to finally free our homes from burning gas.
If in your home it seems intimidating to tick off the multiple steps of disconnecting an old gas cooktop, finding a new induction cooktop, altering a kitchen bench (if needed) and wiring it all up, a business with skills and qualifications across all these trades collectively may be able to assist you.
Much like selecting a new car to buy, choosing from a range of hot water heat pumps can be daunting. Installers that sell not just a single brand of hot water heat pump but rather a range of brands with a range of capabilities may help householders to select the hot water heat pump option best suited to their needs and budget.
Getting the word out
With the fossil-gas industry continuing to spend millions on misleading advertisements, every means we have to spread the word about the advantages of electrifying homes, be it via an old-fashioned printed newspaper, online here at The Fifth Estate, or on social media such as My Efficient Electric Home, continues to be vital. Has a home de-gassing tipping point been reached? Though an enormous amount of work remains to get millions of remaining Australian homes off gas, we have hope.