Bay Area officials are banning new gas water heaters. Have they made the switch in their homes?

As the Bay Area Air District moves toward requiring thousands of homeowners to replace broken natural gas water heaters with electric models that are often more expensive, many of the officials shaping the rule’s rollout have never made the switch themselves.

The transition, which will effectively ban the installation of natural gas water heaters largely in single-family homes, is slated to take effect in January though it could still be pushed back a year. It is expected to push homeowners to adopt heat pump water heaters that don’t pollute but often cost several thousand dollars more to purchase and install. The mandate has become one of the most controversial environmental policies in the Bay Area, so we set out to ask: Do the 24 board members of the agency have direct experience with such replacements?

Only 11 responded. Two of San Francisco’s three representatives said they lived in rentals with a natural gas or steam power unit. Four other board members used gas water heaters. Three declined to discuss their personal residences and another simply declined to comment.

The board is made up primarily of locally elected officials appointed by their counties or cities. They serve part time, alongside their elected positions.

The only board member who told us he has installed an electric model in his own home actually opposes the electric requirement.

“I think that electricity is the way to go, and if you can do it, you should do it,” said the board member, Steve Young, who is also mayor of Benicia. “I think everybody should transition, but there’s a big difference between should and must.”

Young electrified his own home more than a decade ago, installing an electric water heater as well as a heat pump system for heating and cooling. His experience has been positive and he said he could detect essentially no difference in the electric water heater’s performance from his old gas one.

Even so, he worries about affordability. Besides the universal challenge of high energy and housing costs, the residents in his city have faced the shuttering of the Valero refinery, which cost scores of jobs.

And in general, Young doesn’t like the government telling people what to do in their own homes. “It’s gonna be hard for me to get to a place where I would support a mandate in general,” he said. Instead, he favors a voluntary policy heavily incentivized by measures like rebates.

But air regulators face increasing pressure to slash fossil fuel emissions for health and climate reasons. The air district said the transition to electric water heaters and furnaces could save anywhere from approximately $400 to $890 million per year in health impacts in the Bay Area and prevent premature deaths for up to 85 people.

But it has met resistance from many property owners, largely because of the cost of replacing a gas model with a heat pump water heater, the most efficient electric option. The air district estimates the switch will average about $3,500 more. In July, district staff proposed delaying the requirement from January 2027 to January 2028 and adding exemptions for people with limited incomes, or who don’t have enough space in their homes or would need a major electrical upgrade. Those exemptions could total up to 38% of all installations. The board is expected to vote on these amendments in November.

An attempt to rescind the gas-to-electric rule altogether has not been proposed; such a move would require a new public review and comment process before the board could vote, the air district said.

The district is also set to ban the installation of new natural gas furnaces in 2029 and commercial natural gas water heaters in 2031.

The air district covers Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, southwestern Solano and southern Sonoma counties.

A divided board

Despite his current opposition to the mandate, Young supported the board’s initial action. In 2023, he and 19 other colleagues on the air district board passed the ban – with no opposition but one abstention and three members absent. It was one of the most aggressive efforts in the nation to curb pollution from appliances.

He had his reservations and worried about the lower-income residents who may struggle to afford the higher upfront cost of heat pump water heaters. Yet dozens of public speakers praised the measure before the board. In the end, Young said, he didn’t oppose the rule then because “given all the testimony, I could sort of see where it was going, and so there was general consensus without a whole lot of analysis and discussion.”

Now, Young is among at least eight board members who have expressed concern about implementing the rule. Some favor delaying it, while others have called for converting it into a voluntary program. Many others, however, remain committed to the transition.

Tyrone Jue, a board member who voted in favor of the rules in 2023, said in an emailed statement that his apartment building uses a natural gas water heater. Jue, who is also the San Francisco Environment Department Director, is familiar with the transition through his department’s heat pump replacement initiative, which has installed 100 such water heaters in households making less than 80% of the area median income in the last two years.

He said none of the 100 projects needed an increase in electric service capacity, a costly prospect that has scared some property owners who would be subject to the rules. Technology, Jue said, has greatly improved over the past few years.

San Francisco supervisors Bilal Mahmood and Shamann Walton also represent the city on the air board. Mahmood, who joined the air board after the 2023 vote, said his downtown apartment receives direct steam service from Energy Center San Francisco. Walton – who was on the air board in 2023 but was absent during the vote – did not respond to a request for comment.

John Gioia, an air board member and Contra Costa County supervisor who voted for the mandate in 2023, said his home got a natural gas water heater in 2008 before heat pumps became widespread. He is now looking to replace his water heater with a 120-volt heat pump for his household of two.

“I currently have a 100 amp panel and have been told that it can handle the new heat pump water heater and heating/cooling system without any upgrades,” Gioia, who is in the process of fully electrifying his home, said in an email. “There are two benefits to doing so: achieving full more environmentally friendly and cost effective electrification; and no longer having gas and the risks of fire especially after an earthquake.”

Linda Sell, a Sunnyvale councilmember who has been on the air board since early 2026, said she has lived in her home for over thirty years and replaced her water heater with a natural gas model roughly 15 years ago.

“I don’t think I knew of that (an electric unit) as an option, and I didn’t know about the health benefits that it could create,” Sell said. “Since being appointed, I’ve gotten a greater awareness about the benefit of having the non-polluting, non-gas water heaters.”

Sell cited a frequently invoked argument for the rule: the electric transition for both water heaters and furnaces will save up to 85 people from an early death each year.

Young questioned the usefulness of that figure.

“Any life you save is important, but I was looking at it in the larger context of okay, if it’s going to save 80 lives, that’s great, but how many people die of natural causes in the Bay Area every year?” Young said. “To save an additional 80 … is that a sufficient rationale?”

Sell also argued that local and regional rebates often even out the prices between a heat pump and natural gas water heaters.

After receiving the Chronicle’s inquiry, she has contacted approximately 10 contractors to get estimates for installing a heat pump. The cheapest contractor said that an 80 gallon heat pump water heater would cost roughly $2,700 after factoring in rebates from Silicon Valley Clean Energy, Santa Clara County’s nonprofit Community Choice Energy utility.

However, broadly speaking, it is unclear how long rebates will be available and whether there’s enough money for everyone who will apply for them.

‘I don’t have that kind of money’

Monica Brown, a Solano County Supervisor who joined the air board after the 2023 vote, said she favors a voluntary program. A few years ago, Brown installed a natural gas water heater because she couldn’t afford to put in a heat pump.

“I know one or two of my friends did have a heat thing, but when I talked with them they said, well, you had to do this and this, and I thought, I don’t have that kind of money,” said Brown, who is a retired teacher.

Brown also argued Californians are already struggling under rising fuel and food costs, asking “Who’s got the money with the economic situation going on right now?”

Another issue, Young said, is the air district may struggle to stop residents from going to another county where the ban doesn’t apply and finding a plumber to do the work under the table.

“Nobody’s the wiser except the fact that it’s not going to be put in with a permit,” he said.

While the Bay Area Air District is the first to pass such a measure, it is likely betting that more will join it. The California Air Resources Board is developing similar rulemaking that, if passed, would cover the entire state.

“Property owners are required to disclose gas appliances subject to these regulations during real estate transactions, so an unpermitted installation could be problematic for the owner who later sells the property,” the air district added in an emailed statement.

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This article originally published at Bay Area officials are banning new gas water heaters. Have they made the switch in their homes?.