Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: We are soon making the decision to bring or not bring gas to the community

[Elizabeth Magill (pastorlizm]

At Mosaic we had the choice of adding gas as well. Our neighbors to the
north, on the same property, *did* pay to bring in gas, so it goes right by
us (perhaps even under us, I don't know).

At the time we simply couldn't afford it and so we didn't connect to that
line. I had angst about that.

In fact, I've loved being in an all electric (super insulated) home. Number
one reason is zoning--every room is its own zone, has its own thermostat.
So the downstairs never needs to be heated when you are cooking or have a
bunch of people in. The upstairs has one room that gets direct sunlight, so
it is heated much less than another that does not. My office has the heat
on only when I use it--rarely in ordinary times but often now in covid. So
easy to adapt the system to those varied uses. Basically, we only heat a
space when we are in it and cold.

Of course we are dependent on what our electric company chooses to use for
its power source in terms of what damage we are choosing to do to the
environment. We can pay for them to use more renewable sources, but beyond
that have little control of their decisions.
But when we decided to put on solar panels the fact that we have electric
heat means that we essentially have solar heat! I did not see that coming.

My sister, who has gas heat, put in a small solar system that covers her
refrigerator, computers, and lights. We put in a huge system that covers
all that plus heat. And AC in the summer. It feels like a big win.

Liz
Mosaic Commons Cohousing, Berlin, MA

On Sun, Nov 29, 2020 at 9:10 AM R Philip Dowds via Cohousing-L <
cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:

> Jim —
>
> You’ve got some of the right information:  The answer varies with location
> (climate), use habits and so on … but in general, electric systems are
> usually cheaper to install, and sometimes more expensive to run.  Among the
> fossil fuels, natural gas has a lot of advantages, including relatively
> clean burning and currently (thanks to fracking) a relatively low price.
> This apparent low price, however, is due in part to the externalizing of
> air pollution costs, and the use of the atmosphere as a “free” trash bin.
>
> However, we all must understand that fossil fuel combustion must be, for
> most uses, constrained and substituted away.  The “Smart Energy Future” is
> an electric future, particularly at the site of the end user.  A careful
> life cycle cost analysis might manage to show that over the life of the
> system, gas is still cheaper than electricity.  But we can no longer afford
> the cheap deal.  In my opinion.
>
> Thanks,
> Philip Dowds
> Cornerstone Village Cohousing
> Cambridge, MA 02140
>
> mobile: 617.460.4549
> email:   rphilipdowds [at] me.com
>
> > On Nov 28, 2020, at 2:47 PM, Jim Bronson <jimbronsonashland [at] gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > I would love to have any guidance from experienced cohousers about
> > gas/no-gas brought to the RiverSong.  I know there must be a cost savings
> > upfront for being only electric, but it is hard to find out how much that
> > would be - the gas company buries most of those costs and only passes
> them
> > along later when you have become a committed customer.
> >
> > Any guidance on being able to make this decision would be greatly
> > appreciated.
> >
> > Jim Bronson - RiverSong Design Team
> > _________________________________________________________________
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> >
> >
> >
>
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-- 
-Liz
(The Rev. Dr.) Elizabeth Mae Magill
Pastor, Ashburnham Community Church
Minister to the Affiliates, Ecclesia Ministries
www.elizabethmaemagill.com
508-450-0431