'We are not on track': To meet climate goals, RI buildings need cleaner heat. These bills would help.

PROVIDENCE – More than a third of Rhode Island’s planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions come from heating homes, businesses and industrial buildings with fossil fuels, yet the state lacks regulations that would support a transition to cleaner electric heat.

A pair of bills under consideration by the General Assembly aim to decarbonize the heating sector in separate ways.

What's driving this? RI is 'not on track' for climate goals

One proposed by Sen. Alana DiMario would require providers of heating fuels to pay for ways to reduce emissions, such as weatherization or the adoption of electric heat pumps.

The other, put forward by Sen. Meghan Kallman and Rep. Rebecca Kislak, phases in requirements for new buildings to be all-electric.

Supporters of the bills say more aggressive action is necessary if Rhode Island is to meet the mandates in the Act on Climate, the landmark legislation Gov. Dan McKee signed into law three years ago that requires the state meet net-zero emissions by 2050.

“We are not on track to meet our Act on Climate goals, and that is especially true in the building sector,” Amanda Barker, policy advocate with the Green Energy Consumers Alliance, said at a hearing this week on the bills. “The building sector really lacks a comprehensive policy to adequately reduce emissions.”

RI has the most aggressive plan in the nation for slashing emissions

The legislation comes as measures have progressed to slash emissions from electricity and transportation, the two other leading sources of greenhouse gases in the state.

In 2022, Rhode Island adopted the most aggressive plan to ramp up renewable energy of any state in the nation. The reworked standard requires Rhode Island to gradually increase its purchases of renewable energy and has a goal of offsetting all the state’s electric usage with solar, wind and other cleaner sources of power by 2033.

Meanwhile, the state is moving forward with rules modeled on those in California that require automotive dealers to increase offerings of zero-emission vehicles while phasing out sales of new gasoline- and diesel-powered cars by 2035.

Despite those efforts, an analysis commissioned by the Executive Climate Change Coordinating Council showed that under current plans the state would fall short of the next interim target set forth by the Act on Climate.

Most buildings burn fossil fuels for heating

The vast majority of homes in Rhode Island rely on fossil fuels for heating, with about half using natural gas, a quarter using heating oil and 5% using propane.

Switching buildings from those heating systems has been difficult because it requires owners to purchase heat pumps in place of their furnaces. Costs can range from a few thousand dollars to more than $20,000 if new ductwork or other improvements are needed.

The federal government is offering nonrefundable tax credits of up to $2,000 as an incentive, while Clean Heat RI, a program launched by the McKee administration last September using $25 million in federal funds, is offering thousands of dollars more depending on the size of the system installed by a building owner.

But the state program has been slow to take off. So far, the Office of Energy Resources has issued 1,092 rebates for heat pumps totaling $3.4 million through March 31.

Other branches of state government are also trying to tackle heating emissions. The Energy Facility Siting Board is contemplating a moratorium on new natural gas connections on Aquidneck Island as part of a project aimed at reducing the vulnerability of the island’s gas system, which sits at one of the endpoints of the pipeline network that brings gas into New England.

And an advisory group working with the state Public Utilities Commission is considering ways to phase out use of the entire gas system in Rhode Island as part of a planning effort that’s already been done in Massachusetts.

A ban on gas hookups in new buildings is also on the table as part of that docket, which aims to make recommendations later this year to the Executive Climate Change Coordinating Council to incorporate into an updated state plan due by 2025 for meeting the goals of the Act on Climate.

How would it work?

The clean heat standard proposed by DiMario would mirror the state’s renewable energy standard by gradually phasing out reliance on fossil fuels in all buildings through the use of a credit system.

Under her bill, Rhode Island Energy, which distributes natural gas in the state, and heating fuel providers would have to pay for the credits and the money raised from the sales would go toward low-emissions alternatives.

While renewable energy standards are common, clean heat standards have only been adopted in a handful of states, including Vermont and Massachusetts.

At the hearing Wednesday before the Senate Committee on Environment and Agriculture, Kallman said DiMario’s bill would act in concert with the legislation she introduced with Kislak.

They would first require that the owners of large existing buildings, starting with state-owned ones, to report their energy use to the Office of Energy Resources, which would then use the information to create standards that they would have to meet for emissions. The second part of the legislation would direct that new buildings at least be ready to use electric heat.

While the bill is one of the Environment Council of Rhode Island’s top priorities this session and the state Department of Environmental Management and the Office of Energy Resources have voiced support, Rhode Island Energy is opposed and has raised concerns about restricting consumer choice, energy affordability and other issues.

Kallman, however, argued that the state must address building emissions.

“If we don’t tackle this, we are in trouble,” she said.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Two bills will help RI home and building owners switch to heat pumps