New York Passes Bill to Curb Gas Expansion

NEW YORK — Utility ratepayers in New York are one step closer to not having to subsidize the gas line hookups of newcomers to the system.

Last week, the New York Legislature voted to repeal the state’s so-called “100-foot-rule,” a 40-year-old law that prohibited utility companies from charging individual customers for the cost of a new gas service as long as it was within 100 feet of an existing gas line.

At the time, the state was encouraging consumers to move away from oil and coal as heating sources and toward natural gas, which it viewed as a cleaner source of energy.

Since then, the state’s climate agenda has changed dramatically and natural gas is now considered just another fossil fuel.

More than that, however, lawmakers were responding to growing pressure from their constituents, who have complained the old policy is too financially burdensome and left them responsible for often punishing energy bills.

Currently, the estimated cost to ratepayers to subsidize new gas hookups across the state has risen to between $200-$300 million per year.

The new bill, which is currently on Gov. Kathy Hochul’s desk awaiting her signature, requires that the cost of new hookups to gas lines be paid by the customers directly receiving the service. 

Democratic Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon, the sponsor of the bill in the New York Assembly, said she believes the bill gained traction in the chamber because the majority of New Yorkers didn’t realize they were paying for others’ gas hookups. 

“If you need a new hookup to gas, you’re in a position to be able to pay for it and certainly your neighbors shouldn’t be the ones paying for it,” Simon told reporters last week. “It’s deceptive, really —  it makes people think that something is free when it’s not and it falls on all of our shoulders.”  

Climate activists, speaking ahead of this week’s heat wave, also felt that passage of the bill was a step in the right direction.

“We are in the midst of a climate crisis,” said Cameron Clarke, a spokesperson for WE ACT for Environmental Justice, an environmental advocacy group based in Manhattan.

“That’s what’s so important about the accomplishment of the 100-foot rule — we don’t need to continue to subsidize this system that pumps more greenhouse gases into our atmosphere, warms our planet and is frankly unhealthy for our communities,” Clarke continued.  

Now that the bill is on Hochul’s desk, environmental advocates are urging for it to be signed, saying that the “bill marks a turning point” in curbing fossil fuel expansion in the state. 

“If Gov. Hochul fails to sign A8888/S8417 into law, she risks undoing a historic victory that makes New York the first and only state in the country to halt the expansion of the gas distribution system — the pathway to affordability, reliability and safety,” said Kim Fraczek, director of Sane Energy Project, in an email to The Well News. “We cannot allow 19th-century business models to determine our 21st-century future.” 

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and @DanMcCue