Now that our government is entertaining the idea of banning gas stoves, is it about time we stop calling our country the land of the free?

[Anonymous]

[WindAtMyBack]

Entertaining the idea doesn't mean it will happen. Natural gas is very efficient heating, whether it's a stove, hot water or home heating.

I can see wanting to get rid of the old oil burning furnaces, but not natural gas. Also consider that between the stove, hot water and home heating, the stove uses the least gas.

Legislation like this is just for show. It gives politicians the appearance of doing something, when it really has almost no positive effect, and might even make things worse.

Gas stoves are probably mostly in older houses and apartments. This means that forcing everyone to update will have the most financial burden on lower income people. A new stove and electrical wiring will cost a bundle.

[Curmudgeon]

It is mind boggling the eco-dupes want to do this. Natural gas was put into widespread use as THE clean alternative to burning coal in stoves and boilers, which were *filthy*. "Home heating oil" was a tad cleaner, but that just drove up the price of a commodity needed for vehicles (after refining, of course).

Electric heating? Far less efficient, far more costly, and largely requiring more COAL to burn! And these ecodupes won't tolerate another reactor built.

Or maybe it isn't mind-boggling. It's about making us poorer and taking away our choices, in other words, tyranny.

[abc3643]

This:
"Electric heating? Far less efficient"

Electric heating is the most efficient (*) form of heat production; it is almost 100% efficient. It cannot be otherwise. This is because of "Joule heating"; as electrons travel through a wire, the atomic collisions are friction and that will release radiative heat.
The amount of heat released is equal to the power of the device = R * I^2.
R is the resistance
I is the current
So, if you have a 1500 W space heater, you pay for 1500 W of power and get almost 1500 W of heat.
It's the best heat there is; it just happens to be expensive.

(*) Efficiency = Energy Output of a System / Energy Input to the System

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joule_heating

[Curmudgeon]

@abc3643 Three words: transmission line losses These come from the power station and even more so from various "substations" (collections of transformers and coils) that distribute it) . You are not accounting for any of that...

You will need *more* energy to heat the same house or boil the same amount of water with electric heat coils than you will with a simple natural gas flame. Try it sometime. The all electric homes built in my area have far higher utility costs per month than do those with natural gas mains. They are cheaper for builders, sure, but not for occupants.

"It just happens to be expensive" - that's the point, ugh.

[abc3643]

Well, get solar. Then you won't have any transmission costs and its free.

I worked for GE Power Systems for several years and have physics and engineering degrees. I understand how this works.

To help your point with "efficiency", I think you were concerned about "$/watt of heat" in which case, electricity is perhaps the most expensive.

Thermodynamic efficiency is what I wrote earlier.

[Curmudgeon]

@abc3643 OK, so you understand that solar power just *cannot* be reliable base load electric power. And it isn't free if in order to install it, I have to borrow a lot of money, and then pay back a lot more money over the subsequent years.

That said, I am not knocking solar electricity - in my part of the world where half of the year the San Joaquin region is hot blazing sunshine with little wind, it fits "peak load" ideally. Far better than the farce of windmills. Had I not already taken out a HELOC to remodel a fixer upper home (and the variable rates on it are now shooting up - ACK!) and I had more equity, I would seriously consider installing a solar electric system on my roof.

Some kinds of power are great and cheap, but require a large capital outlay, like hydroelectric power. Only entities that can issue billions in bonds and repay them by revenues (i. e., governments) can really build them. So it is with solar systems as of now. Yah, people with the equity can do them, and more power to them (no pun intended), but those of us living paycheck to paycheck after we fund our 401Ks and Roth IRAs (and we are the luckier ones, a lot of people are paycheck to paycheck with little or no retirement funding at all!) not so much.

You were with GE Power Systems? Sigh. In an alternate universe where the USA was not swept up by "No Nukes" hysteria, Rancho Seco (shut down entirely by said hysteria) would still be reliably providing base load power, the GE Nuclear Energy Design Plant at Curtner Avenue and Monterey Road in San Jose would still be going strong, and "Neutron Jack" Welch would not have axed it as part of his preventing the then conglomerate from hemorrhaging financially. I had more than few childhood friends whose parents were hard hit by that.

gildahh.wordpress.com/2017/07/08/the-plant/

[Anonymous]

25 years ago in Britain what the government did to discourage people from using coal fires was to give people incentives by giving grants for installation of oil burners in every house upon the agreement that the back boiler ovef the fireplace be disabled, you can light the fire just not heat the heaters or hot water and it worked. People rarely burn coal fires anymore, air quality has improved a lot, less people have asthma.
Recently they started giving people grants to people to get installation installed in their attics and walls and new pvc windows installed to insulate the house so they need less heating and it's worked.

[Asker]

Sure. I'm not arguing for or against the necessity of it. I'm pointing out that we aren't free, not even "mostly free," any longer.

Though, as a side-commen5, I will also point out that government has banned alcohol, gay, sex, and plenty of other things they had no business banning in the past.

[Opinion Owner]

Well these are your elected officials. Soon they will bann petrol and diesel cars from cities to control air pollution

[Cassie88]

I don't know much about gas stoves (never used one), but aren't they dangerous? You know, don't they have a tendency to explode? That could be one of the reasons for the ban.

And yes, you should stop calling your country "the land of the free", because most nations in Europe, Asia and the Pacific (ex. NZ) are freer than yours, and have been for generations.

[Asker]

I don't know, I don't use one either. But gas stoves are still very common and if their tendancy to explode was anything remotely notable I'm sure they wouldn't be as common as they are.

And no, the reason for the ban is not for that.

[abc3643]

Don't be ridiculous.

Do you know who is free?
Squirrels
Eagles
Bunnies
Fish, etc.

That's because they don't have ANY government.

The moment you live under a government - as almost all humans do - you automatically and by definition surrender some of your "freedom". BUT, what it also gives you is a different form of freedom: Freedom from fear.

You hopefully should understand this someday. Unfortunately, all to many conservative nut jobs don't.

In the meantime, if you want to really be free, become like a wild animal.

Consider travelling to Brazil, going to the US Embassy to surrender your passport, and become a native in the jungles of the Amazon.

[Asker]

Yes, Mr. Technicality, we aren't free to murder, rape, or steal, nobody in this context is talking about absolute freedom/anarchy.

[NamerOfStars]

No- just the land of the smart. Not only is this being pushed without a replacement plan in place, it's being pushed IN WINTER. People will be less inclined to pay attention to things that threaten them in the cold if you make those threats when it's hot outside, but now?

[DarkWinterNights]

There are electric stoves… but this would hurt every restaurant in the country and add a massive power drain to an already stressed and outdated power grid. I feel like this is intentional at this point.

[NamerOfStars]

@DarkWinterNights Electric stoves run on electricity, and the primary source of electricity in the US is natural gas.

[DarkWinterNights]

Of course, but their “official” reasoning for banning them would be to eliminate the natural gas fumes and chemicals given off from the stoves themselves indoors.

[NamerOfStars]

@DarkWinterNights Doubtless- but that's utter nonsense, given that methane is naturally odorless, and the only reason it even HAS a smell is the sulfur added specifically to make leaks detectable. Come to think of it, HAS Hochul given an official reason yet?

[Sixgunsound]

The reason is to detonate the aging and unmaintained electrial grid with all the new demand with no new apacuty added. They are trying to lower our standard of living to that of Soviet Russia and to increase the threat value if displeasing or resisting them by taking away our alternative means if heating and cooking if/when they institute electricity rationing that they totally didn't know was coming when they kept shoving more and more demand onto the grid by making alternatives they can't flip a switch and shut off during the winter illegal.

[Fireguy17]

Idiots.
It would really be nice that if someday they would take care of something a bit more important than cow farts and gas stoves.
You know stuff like the homeless, the drug problem, the crumbling infrastructure, hunger, more help for education, the debt and the deficit, just all sorts of really important things than running our day to day lives.

[NaultD]

What's a greater freedom, living with changing regulations or a soul trapped in a husk of a body? Is the lead in the paint really necessary? Use your brain a little bit before the carbon monoxide poisons whats left.

[Agape93]

The USA was never a land of the free. Just concealed tyranny.

[FunkyMonkee]

Sure sounds like it, to me!! I think I already stopped calling it last a number of years ago when the dummycrats started acting like spoiled rotten brats that HAD to have their way!!

[exitseven]

Gas stoves will not be banned. Too many people would get mad. I guess we are still a free country at least until the next crazy idea that liberals will have.

[LiamJHayden]

The Federal Government is a Totalitarian Clown Show.

[BJP21]

America is on a fossil fuel addiction. We won't have a land of the free if the land is uninhabitable because the immanent dangers of climate change. People are too stubborn to get off the addiction.

[Anonymous]

Talking about free? The abortion issues in this country are more important. That isn’t state or federal business.

[Asker]

Then whose business is it?

[Opinion Owner]

The people who made the baby and their doctor.

[joeldalton]

It's time for a national divorce. We absolutely can not live with these lunatics anymore.

[Asker]

We don't need a divorce, we need policies that reflect that states are independent, as we are the UNITED States, not the singular federal state.

Federal government has ceased too much power over the states.

[joeldalton]

That will not change. What, you think they'll agree to give up their power willingly?

[DarkWinterNights]

@Asker, In what way is the United States united? We can’t agree on anything. Not even the most basic rights. There is nothing but proximity tying America together. I say we separate peacefully while we still can.

[Sixgunsound]

@DarkWinterNights the issue is that people whose power, tax receipts, and ego identity depend on ruling from sea to shining sea are not going to voluntarily let any of that walk away. And even if they would, who gets control of the nuclear ICBM's? The submarines? The carriers? No, its winner take all and hope the ruling class doesn't nuke it all if they don't get to keep it. A civil war would also present a perfect opportunity for China to attack.

[Sixgunsound]

We've already seen people in the old guard GOP like McConnel would rather burn down America's best interests and accept second class status than lose power.

[joeldalton]

@Sixgunsound China could attack today and the left coast would surrender to them.

[Sixgunsound]

Both coasts would surrender. Biden already sold our largest naval base to NATO which really doesn't like us now that we expect them to pay and contribute at least something.

[Sparkie460]

The government wants to get rid of everything that runs by gas. This includes lawn equipment, home heating, stoves and vehicles. They want to take away all our rights.

[In_Trance]

How do you even have time to acknowledge this

[Asker]

How many seconds do you think it took me to acknowledge this?

[Dinosaursandanime65]

So they’ll use deadly force to get us to use camp fires or something?

[RealMarek]

Yes, we should stop going on about being the land of the free. It’s just not true anymore.

[Anonymous]

Seems logical. Is this all you have to worry about?

[Opinion Owner]

No one is coming for your gas stoves.

I do wish we could seize the shit out of your gaslighting, though.

[joeldalton]

you sure about that, tard?

[NamerOfStars]

Losing the ability to cook food cripples your capacity for self-sustenance; it's only logical if the government plans to take more control over the lives of the citizenry. Of course, that wouldn't be the case IF something were in place to replace natural gas-burning stoves- but there isn't.

And it's damned disingenuous to claim "they're not coming for your gas stoves", given the vast number of rental properties that are going to fall under government-friendly holding companies the instant that eviction moratoriums end; whether it was intentional or otherwise, the response to Covid has lead (and is leading) to a consolidation of power unseen since the Civil War.

[joeldalton]

@NamerOfStars Now the WEF failed state of Canada is jumping on the bandwagon, too.

[Modеrator]

@joeldalton nah they're not jumping anywhere. They were in on it all along, the people just got controllable enough now.

[NamerOfStars]

@joeldalton Canada gained its independence from the UK in the most Canadian way possible: by asking politely. However, that "independence" consisted merely of dissolving their ties to the UK *Parliament*; they're still under control of the king. Of course, Charles is reasonable and in touch with reality, but a few generations down the line, that might all change, and then the Canadians will have precious little recourse but to beg other countries for help.

A land that gained its freedom by demanding LESS representation in government is likely to have some skewed priorities.

[Asker]

Do you think you're a reasonable person asking if that's all I have to worry about? What percentage of people living today do you think would only have one worry in life, and that being the possession of their gas stove?

[joeldalton]

Are you that stupid to think that it’s about a gas stove?

[Anonymous]

Where were you when they decided to do away with analog t. v. channels. Or how bout when the discontinued the telegraph.

[Guy13]

Can't argue with that.

[jimmy2]

I don't think they can do that how are they going to know who has one

[artsy_dragon]

Wait that's your concern rn? 😂

[Asker]

Oh yeah, out of all the things happening right now, it's this that is at the very top of my list. You're ability to deduce is quite remarkable.

[artsy_dragon]

Very funny haha 😂

[Asker]

Okay maybe I'm being a little too mean, my apologies, lol.

[artsy_dragon]

No you're being snarky and I would or replied in a better way I just don't have the energy. I know it's banter though

[Revvl6pro]

Liberalism is a mental disorder.

[jshm2]

When was it ever "free" to begin with?

[Dargil]

It will never pass the House.

[DARKCLOUD1945X]

The ASSHOLES are at it again.

[Snakeyes7]

It stopped being that decades ago.

[Anonymous]

More overreach from liberals, and yes, I agree.

[collie22]

Anonymous really

[Asker]

collie22 yes