Climate Action Committee - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the Napa County Climate Action Committee. Let's begin the meeting at 9.32 and may I have a roll call?

Member Gallagher? Here. Member Reeves? Here. Member Gift?

Present.

Member Painter? Here. Member Joseph? Here. Member Lamatina? Here. Chair Eisenberg?

Here.

Thank you.

Thank you. Please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. Face the flag, put your right hand over your heart, pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. As soon as I get my bag off my chair.

There we go.

Okay, and this is the time for public comment. Anyone may address the Climate Action Committee regarding any subject over which the committee has jurisdiction, but which is not on today's posted agenda or is on the consent agenda. In order to provide all interested parties an opportunity to speak, time limitation is three minutes per speaker. And so as required by government code, no action or discussion will be undertaken on any item raised during the public comment period. So if you'd like to make a public comment on an item that is not on the agenda, please come up to the lectern. Good morning.

Good morning. Good morning, Climate Action Committee members. My name is Liliana Koresh. I'm an incoming sophomore at Stanford, a graduate from Napa High, and most importantly, the former president of a student-led environmental advocacy organization, Napa Schools for Climate Action. This past year, as I became integrated into the sustainability community at Stanford, I noticed a common theme emerge across the projects that I took part in and the conversations I had with others, the importance of urgency. According to NASA, anthropogenic pollution has created a concentration of 432 parts per million of CO2 in our atmosphere. Global temperatures have risen by 1.5 degrees Celsius and much more. These changes have resulted in increased frequency of natural disasters impacting communities worldwide. Hence, urgency amongst decision makers like you to make bold decisions that drive climate action forward are critical. That being said, today I ask you all to approach your goal of reaching net zero emissions by before the year 2030 with urgency and focus on shifting our community's dependency on fossil fuels to clean energy. A way to facilitate this transition is to implement prohibitions on the creation of new gas stations and the expansion of existing infrastructure, while simultaneously researching ways to make electric appliances like EVs more accessible. To mine and Napa Schools for Climate Action's understanding, the city of Napa's moratorium on new fossil fuel stations has now expired, and a recently published zoning public review draft indicates that a construction of new gas stations is indeed permitted. This represents a huge setback for climate action in Napa, and I urge you all to question this recommendation as new gas stations would mean new highly polluting environments. Specifically, these gas stations release volatile organic compounds into the surrounding air and increase health risks in our neighborhoods. In fact, a recent study published in the Science Direct found that children born within 300 feet of a gasoline station showed higher risk for developing cancers such as leukemia. Thus, as Yonville, St. Helena, American Canyon, and Calistoga have all worked to create such prohibitions, I urge the City of Napa and Napa County to do the same. This past year, I also got to watch Napa Schools for Climate Action team with pride as they worked hard to advance climate restoration through the House Concurrent Resolution 46. I would like to thank the NVOSD, the Napa RCD, the Napa County Board of Education, American Canyon, and Napa County for passing resolutions endorsing this federal policy and urging each city and town in the county to follow suit. It's important that we prioritize climate restoration as much as our net zero goal, as once we reach it, we need a game plan for how to address the heat trapping pollution that remains. Thank you for listening to my comments this morning, and I hope that today you prioritize the urgency of climate action in each decision that you make.

Thank you for your comments. You did a good job of giving a lot of information within three minutes. Hi, please come to the lectern. Thank you.

Thank you.

Chris Malen. I wanted to follow this young lady because she's inspirational. It's good to see young people take time to come and speak with you. Yes, this morning I just wanted to revisit a subject that I have brought before you before, which is the burn piles, thousands of them now because we have over 5,000 acres of vineyards being pulled. Well, I don't know that they're all being pulled, but the grapes were not harvested from. I travel the watershed quite a bit, and I'm seeing hundreds of burn piles. And I think you have discussed in the past trying to address the low-hanging fruit. It could be fairly easy to get these people to mulch and separate the woody organic matter from the metal posts and wires that are part of the vineyard. Right now they just ball it all up into one and then they set it on fire. And it's horrific to see those burn piles all over the place. And we know that it's just nasty carbon going straight up into the air. And all the work you do to reduce carbon and then boom, here we're doing something like that. And it could be beneficial for the soil to spray all that mulch on to the land and let it sink into the soil instead of going up into the air. The microbes do a very good job of breaking that down. and it brings up a better crop of grass and wildflowers. So I hope we can do something about that. I do have a video I want to present to staff to see if they'll show it to you. Not today, of course, but in the future. So I'll try to work with Ryan to show you how intense those burn piles are. The other thing is to keep up front and center nature-based solutions to climate. I don't think the climate action plan, the regional adaptation climate action plan addresses that squarely enough. There are opportunities right before us right now. to bring lands into nature-based solutions to climate change. There is a 12-acre parcel within the city limits of Napa and there are a few of us visiting county and city staff to try to bring that into nature-based solution. And I think it's important that we look at other opportunities as soon as possible. Thank you very much.

Thank you for your comments. Are there any other public comments? Please come to the lectern.

Hi, everyone. I just wanted to quickly introduce myself. I just started with the City of American Canyon just about two months ago. I'm their new sustainability analyst. I'm actually a Napa local. I grew up here. So just wanted to say hi, and I'm excited to collaborate with you all. Thanks.

Lauren Webster.

Welcome. Are there any other public comments? Are there any public comments online?

We have one caller. Jody, you will have three minutes.

Good morning. Good morning, Napa Climate Action Committee. My name is Jody Tims, and I just wanted to say how excited I am to watch your meeting, at least for a little bit here. I am the chair of the Fairfax Climate Action Committee, and I do a lot of work in Marin County, keeping sort of keeping track and helping to solidify the work that all of our local municipal climate action committees or sustainability commissions do. And I've always heard about Napa and what you guys are up to. I kind of hear it off and on. So I dropped into the meeting this morning. I hopefully can speak about in support of item 5A, but I have another meeting in a bit. So I'm hoping you'll hear me again. But I also work with 350 Marin, the nonprofit climate organization. We have summer interns whom we asked to give public comments. So it was great to hear the young Stanford students speak as well. So I'm listening in on support and hope to speak again later. Thank you so much for all that you're doing.

on behalf of the climate thank you for your comments are there any other public comments any others online we have no other callers thank you so we will close public comments and move on to the consent agenda there is one item on the consent agenda and that is the minutes from the previous meeting is there a motion to approve the consent agenda thank you a second Thank you very much. All in favor of approving the consent agenda, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? I believe the consent agenda is now passed. And we'll move now to administrative item 5A. We're going to be receiving a presentation on the Bay Area District Rules 94 and 96. relating to admissions reduction of nitrogen oxides from natural gas fired furnaces and water heaters in buildings in the Bay Area. And presenting is.

Good morning. My name is Jennifer Lam. I'm a manager in the Regulatory Development Division at the Bay Area Air District, and I'll be presenting on the topic just described. Thank you. Okay. So I'll go ahead and get started. So today I'm going to give you an overview of the zero NOx building appliance rules at the Bay Area Air District, which we also refer to as the building appliance rules for short. and explain the impact of these appliances on regional and local air quality the intent of the rules as well as an update from us about current flexibility concepts to provide possible exemptions that are being considered by our board of directors or will be considered so before we begin i just wanted to provide some grounding about what the bay area air district is so we were formed in 1955 by the california state legislature and we are the regional regulatory air quality agency over stationary sources of air pollution in the nine-county Bay Area, which you can see on the slide here, which includes all of Napa County. For your neighbors, it includes parts of Sonoma County and parts of Solano County, but all of Napa. And the air district is governed by a 24-member board of directors, including Supervisor Gallagher, who are locally elected officials from the cities and counties in the region. And so the Air District's mission is to improve air quality to protect public health, reduce historic and current environmental inequities, and mitigate climate change and its impacts. So now I'm going to focus on our Rule 96 for small water heaters. So in the Bay Area, and just sort of generally about air pollution and public health, the main air pollutants that we're concerned about as the Bay Area Air District from a public health standpoint are particulate matter, sometimes referred to as PM or PM 2.5, PM 10, that's just different sizes of particulate matter, toxic air contaminants and chemicals that form ground level ozone. And so nitrogen oxides, or NOx, which is something that you'll hear frequently with regards to these rules, which is emitted from a variety of sources, including natural gas combustion, are a precursor or react with other chemicals in the atmosphere to form both particulate matter and ozone. And so these pollutants are linked to serious health issues like asthma, bronchitis, and emphysema, and increasingly linked to things like heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and dementia. And science continues to provide us better information about the detrimental impacts of air pollutants and the harms to our communities and our climates. So with that context, I'm going to talk a little bit about why I'm talking about water heaters and furnaces in your home. So on this bar chart on the screen, you can see that based on our inventories for the Bay Area, natural gas combustion in buildings actually emits more nitrogen oxides on a yearly basis than either passenger vehicles or all the fuel refineries in the Bay Area. When we think about sources of air pollution, obviously one water heater, one furnace isn't a massive source. But when we talk about public health as a whole and how that impacts the general population, it's a very important source for us to figure out what we can do to reduce emissions and reduce health impacts for our residents. And so breaking down that dark blue bar about natural gas combustion in buildings, the vast majority, so over 90% of emissions from natural gas combustion in buildings is from space and water heating. Frequently we think about cooking and stoves and things like that inside your home, but For actual natural gas usage, it's actually a very small percentage. And then space and water heating typically vent outdoors and contribute to public health and regional air quality, which is the main thrust of our work. and so this is sort of the main reason why when we're talking about building appliance rules from the bay area air district i am specifically speaking about space heating water heating and we do not currently have rules that govern emissions from stoves or other natural gas fired appliances and i won't be discussing that all today So looking at major health benefits from Rules 9-4 and 9-6, so we have these two rules. 9-4 is for furnaces and 9-6 is for water heaters. And we had zero NOx appliance standards that were actually adopted by our Board of Directors in March of 2023 requiring Home hot water and heating appliances to eliminate these emissions of nitrogen oxides to protect public health. And so these emission reductions from the rules are projected to result in significant public health impacts. Most critically, improving regional overall air quality needed to attain and maintain the national ambient air quality standards that are set by the US EPA as well as the state of California. And notably, our modeling showed that the particulate matter reductions resulting from full implementation of both of these rules would have the greatest benefits in the Bay Area's community of color. And health modeling showed that full implementation of these rules could avoid up to 890 million deaths. dollars per year in health impacts through the Bay Area as a whole and prevent up to 85 premature deaths per year. So this is sort of why we see this as a priority for the regional district. So what are our rules? So Regulation 9, Rules 4 and 6, or Rules 9-4 and 9-6, have actually been in place in the Air District for decades. And so they only cover space heating and water heating, as I've discussed, not stoves, ovens, fireplace, or clothes dryers. We've had NOx standards for space and water heating since the 1980s and sort of everyone in California is covered by an air district and all of our sort of adjacent and other large air districts in the state of California have had very similar rules with NOx standards for space and water heating also going back decades. And then in 2023, we adopted our zero NOx standards, which have a gradual phase-in for zero NOx. And so, again, immediate replacement is not required here. What these rules do govern is that they apply to new sales or installations after the list of compliance dates in the rules. So when a furnace or water heater sort of reaches the end of its regular useful life, then when you put a new one in, you have to make sure that it meets the requirement of the rule at that time. And homes can also keep and repair current gas appliances and water heating appliances until they need to be replaced. So repair is also completely fine under this rule. Our rules are technology neutral. They don't mandate a specific type of appliance. They just need to meet the zero knock standard. And so this is just a sort of illustration of how this landscape has changed over time. And so there's – when we first passed these rules in 2023, there was technology on the market, mostly electric heat pump technology with – available for installation, easily available for installation to meet the requirements of these rules. Since then, so the chart is actually from January 2022 up to January 2026, we can see how much proliferation of these units has increased in new installations. And it continues to grow over time. Also, the breadth of availability in terms of different manufacturers and different types of units and different voltages of units has also increased a lot over the course of those past four years. So we see that as a very good market signal. So specifically, Rule 96 for water heaters, which is our current focus because it's our first compliance date coming up from our original 2023 rule. So our current compliance start date is January 1st, 2027. So that means that under the way the rules are currently written, for units manufactured after January 1, 2027, in order to be sold or installed in the Bay Area, they would need to meet the zero NOx requirement. And so, We convened, we conducted significant research sort of over the course of the two years in between the passage of the rules and then up until December of 2024 to sort of get additional information about how the landscape is evolving, sort of some of the information we saw on the previous slide, as well as costs and potential areas of development. implementation readiness where there might be some roadblocks or things that need to be overcome in order to keep moving forward with these rules and equitable implementation. And so through that research, we had some key findings, including that based on thousands of project examples that we examined for the past few years, the incremental cost, which is the sort of extra cost on top of, sort of above and beyond what a like-for-like gas replacement would be is about $1,800 versus new gas tankless and $3,500 compared to the cost of a standard gas-tanked water heater. And these costs can be reduced by leveraging local, state, and financial rebates. And so... With this, we found there are solutions to this. I think a lot of this comes from electrical capacity. There are a lot of new 120-volt plug-in heat pump water heaters and other strategies to help manage and lower costs. But there are scenarios that we found to be sort of significant cost drivers in these incremental costs, including appliance relocation, the need for electric panel upsizing if a 120-volt unit doesn't work. as well as the potential for emergency replacements. And so as a result of this implementation working group and all of the research that we did, staff is currently working on flexibility exemptions to sort of further amend these rules as we move forward to account for these scenarios that we found through this extensive research. I'm going to quickly move to our furnace rule and just describe what that is before returning to more details about where we are on 9-6 right now. And so our other rule is rule 9-4 for furnaces. And so our current compliance start date for that is for units manufactured after January 1st of 2029. And so right now we are actually in sort of the middle slash tail end of our implementation working group. for these units. And so we've been meeting over the course of the past year and a half with a large group of stakeholders sort of doing the same research that we did for the water heaters to try and find where these cost drivers are, where they still exist, what new technology has come up since we passed the rules originally. And our sort of final session and our meeting with our board of directors to sort of present all of this information about 9-4 and sort of our presented path forward will be given to our board of directors, which is planned for December of this year. And there's more information about that on our website. We also have a public meeting of that implementation working group, which I believe will be in August. But we're sort of midstream on this same research process for furnaces that we completed for water heaters a couple years ago. So I'm going to get into what our potential flexibility exemptions are for Rule 9-6 as a result of all of that research. So our first flexibility concept is we refer to it as project constraints. And so that really means sort of like physical or other electrical barriers associated with like what's actually happening at the site in someone's home in a building and so we want to alleviate financial burdens for certain conditions or applications that are known to result in higher costs and longer installation times which is also obviously a concern for water heaters and so our examples for that are electrical or space constraints as well as existing hydronic systems and so hydronic system is basically you use a large hot water tank to provide both hot water to your home as well as to act as heat exchanger basically to heat the air in your home as well. And so a simple example of this is like a radiant floor that has sort of water running through it. But there are other types of hydronic systems as well that sort of heat the air that's then pushed into your home. So those have some more complicated scenarios just in terms of how the setup works and replacement and things like that. So we want to make sure to account for that. as well as high heat demands for restaurants, just because gas water heaters work a little bit faster, can work a little bit faster and a little bit hotter in scenarios where you need really high heat water. And then, so what we're looking at for this is that either the purchaser, the homeowner, or a licensed contractor would certify that the project has, sort of meets one of these covered conditions, And then they would be provided approval to purchase and install noncompliant equipment. I'm going to talk a lot about sort of receiving this approval and this exemption process. Right now, this is something that the staff's intention and the direction that we receive from our board is that this would be an immediate and self-certified process. And so you would sort of fill out a form and say this is the conditions required. in my home, this is where it's going to be installed, and then we would immediately provide you an exemption certificate to be able to purchase that water heater because, again, this is a scenario in which a lot of cases your water heater goes out and you had no idea that it was going to go out in the next five years and you need hot water and you need to take a shower. And so our intention from a compliance and enforcement standpoint on that is really to look at all of those exemptions that we're receiving on a macro basis to allow people to get these exemptions if they feel they need them and then to have a data set look back and say, OK, does this meet with sort of what our expectations are of how many of these we think we're going to get? Is there anything we need to change in terms of how we're wording this, what we're requiring, that sort of thing? But we want to allow people the flexibility to have what they feel that they need in their home. And that sort of self-certification and immediacy is true as I continue to speak about exemptions as we move forward. So our second flexibility concept is for emergencies. And so our goal here is to support certain situations when gas equipment may be needed. to provide hot water for the homeowner until a zero NOx unit can be installed. And so should there be a sudden equipment failure or the home needs electrical service upgrades or additional construction, a licensed contractor would have access to sort of have a few. I think our current draft is three non-compliant units that they can sort of use as loaners for their clients that they can install on a temporary basis. I will say this is something that has been a concept and has been included in a lot of incentive programs in the area. A lot of it hasn't been heavily used actually because the 120 volt units are very much available and those can be installed much faster In just a normal outlet just as fast as a like for like gas replacement would be but in a scenario in which there is a need for a Maybe a larger unit and homeowner does want to upgrade and do that electrical work and keep moving forward we want to allow them the possibility to have this emergency service and then do the work that they want to do to get what they want in their home and And then so our next flexibility concept is income qualification. And so obviously, $3,500 is not zero dollars. It's a lot of money to a lot of people, and we definitely want to recognize that, especially if it sort of comes out of the blue. and so um our goal here is to alleviate financial burdens for lower income property owners um and so we have we had a couple different pathways we're actually intending to move forward at this time with the second bullet under examples of thresholds under consideration and so um if someone if a household is at or below 250 of the federal poverty guidelines which for a family of four is a income of just over $80,000 a year, or is housing cost burdened, which we define as their sort of housing costs, so their monthly rent or mortgage and property taxes to be greater than 28% of their monthly income. If you sort of meet, if you self-certify to meet either of those requirements, then we would provide you an exemption to do a lake-for-lake replacement if you And our intention here, we want to provide this option for folks if they really feel as though they do not have the access to funds or the time and attention to figure out an incentive program and they just need hot water, right? We don't want to leave people without hot water. However, when we do provide this exemption, our intention is to have a lot of education pathways along the way to say, hey, you said that you live in Napa. Did you know that MCE provides this incentive that is specifically available to you as a low-income property owner or low-income renter? to steer people in that direction and make sure that they know that these programs are available, as a lot of incentive programs that are currently available are specific to low- and middle-income folks. But again, we do want to provide this option if, for whatever reason, people decide that they're like, I can't afford this, and I don't have the time to figure any of this out. That's a valid stance to take for them. And then the other concept that we identified in our research and our implementation working group is that we do need to accommodate for a technology gap for very small size water heaters. There just aren't as many zero NOx options available on the market for units that are under 35 gallons. This is something that we see may change in the future. But for now, we do see a market gap here. accounts for some scenarios where there is a space constraint and there's not room to make any changes. And so a lot of times you will find in studio apartments or ADUs, places like that. But again, this is really just a market gap in terms of what's available for manufacturers. We will allow continued sales of these very small capacity tanked water heaters and our current draft for that is under 35 gallons. So our next steps here, so we have June 2026 up here. I think we're still in internal review. It might be like July 2nd. But because we want to make sure we have everything sort of dialed and ready to go out and that people can really provide comments. But we're working very hard on this draft language that will go out for public comment. in the next week for Rule 9-6. And so this is, again, a draft. This is not our final proposal per se. We've been talking about these concepts. We've been workshopping them a lot. But we want to make sure that people are able to provide initial comment on Words in front of them, right? Because it always means that something a little bit different when you see the actual rule language. Um, and then following that public comment period, we'll take all that feedback in work on all of our other analyses and then bring our final proposal for amendments to our board of directors at their November meeting, which is on November 4th. And so right now, the compliance start date for the rules as it's written is January 1st, 2027. I cannot speak for or get ahead of my board of directors. However, our intention with these rules and the draft amendments that are going to come out is that in order to accommodate this exemption process that we've been talking about and sort of Building all this out continuing public education is that we are planning on pushing out that compliance date from January 1st So my current expectation as the manager for this project is that it will that there will not be a January 1st 2027 start date for this We've discussed with our board directors October 2027 or sort of a year from adoption. That's sort of the general space that we're in right now. However, we'll sort of see what comes out of that final board meeting of what they decide to adopt. So I believe that is my last slide for now and I can answer any questions.

Okay. Thank you very much. Before public comments and our general board discussion, are there any clarifying questions from the board?

I have one. Okay. Mr. Joseph. On the cost issues, you talk about a $3,500 differential for a regular natural gas tank and 1,800 for tankless. To put that in perspective, because I think there were some others, that it's like 7,000 is the average cost for an electric heater of sorts. So just to be clear, that means based on the average, it's about 3,500 to install a traditional one and 7 grand for a heat pump version.

Yeah, that's roughly accurate, yeah. And those numbers, that incremental cost sort of includes all of these cost-driving scenarios that I was talking about that we're trying to solve for. And so then when you take that out, that's when it goes down.

Is the database big enough to be able to say, okay, if you didn't have an electric panel constraint or a space constraint, what's the differential if you're just saying pull this out, put this in?

Yeah, I mean, it ranges a little bit, and I don't have – we can. I think it's a lot of really manual data, but the data is – all this data is from thousands of projects that are done through TechClean California, which is the sort of statewide incentive program run by the CEC, and so they've done – thousands and thousands of these installations across the state. So that's what it's based on. And it can be pulled out from there. There is still an incremental cost, but again, it's much lower than that $3,500 because that $3,500 includes all of these cost-driving scenarios.

Right. That's what I was hoping we could have to be able to say it could be as low as this if life is good and this much if it's bad.

Yeah, I think it could be as much as $3,500. It can be the same cost. It can actually be less expensive if you get a bunch of incentives. So there is a range in there.

Okay, great. Thank you. Other clarifying questions? Yes, Member Alicino.

In terms of local and state mandates, there's been analysis in terms of how much money we need to hopefully bank for subsidies, either on a county or city basis or statewide basis. I would like to know more like countywide if we're going to be advocating or looking for some funds to help subsidize hardship situations or low-income families.

Yeah, we do have some data on sort of what the incentive gap there is. And it I don't I don't have sort of any specific information in my head right now. But that's definitely something that we could get to the committee if that's of interest for you guys for advocating.

Yeah, I think that would be helpful to know what that is. And then is there any other funds through your agency to also help with those subsidies?

So at this time, the Air District does not have funds specific to this. We do have a program called the Clean Heat Program, which incentivizes the replacement of actually the decommissioning of fireplaces and installing a heat pump space heating system as a result of that, but not specific to this. We are hoping to be able to provide some, but for now we're trying to sort of work with all of our partners that all the CCAs and Bayron and others that are already providing these incentives and sort of funnel folks to that because it's also a pretty fragmented landscape and we want to make sure people are aware of what's out there.

Excellent. And the last question, I think I know the answer, but are we the first or your agency the first to implement this initiative in the U.S.? Yes. Okay. That's what I thought. Okay. Thank you very much. Thanks for your presentation. Mm-hmm.

Okay, remember, then member gift.

I just want to ask a clarifying question about the time frame that the emergencies generate when you, you. Replace with a gas, is there a limit on the amount of time you use that emergency item?

We don't have that built in right now just because it's from an enforcement perspective. If a contractor is installing it in someone's house, it's pretty hard to track. I think our hope is that by providing a limited number of those to each contractor sort of based on their business license, that incentivizes them to sort of get them in, get the work done, get them out so that they can use them for their other clients.

Member Gift?

Yes, thank you.

Again, just a point of clarification and to build on what Member Alessio had said, we are the first in the nation, which is very exciting and great and promising. How long has this rule been in effect? Just so we can go back and defend it to our communities that we've had a good amount of time to educate them.

Yes, so the zero knock standard was passed originally in March of 2023 with that January 1st, 2027 date. So that was sort of our ramp up period. But also during that period, we did this additional implementation work where we identified some existing gaps. But yeah, 2023 was the date of zero knock standard was passed. Thank you.

Yes. Sorry.

MS. Thank you. I have just also one clarifying question, and it was prompted by what you just said, because one of the situations that I think we will hear about is it's very often that a water heater breaks and it's 9 in the morning and you have kids that are going to need a bath by 7 o'clock that night. So it's an urgency issue. So that exemption actually would lie, would the exemption lie with the contractor so it wouldn't be the burden of the homeowner and they could use it periodically when they encounter that situation so that the homeowner is not necessarily burdened with figuring all this out and also trying to figure out when their kids are going to get a bath. That's accurate. Okay, thank you.

OK. There are no more clarifying questions. Let's open it to public comments. A reminder, public comments are limited to three minutes. But I would like to remind everybody there's absolutely no penalty for using fewer than three minutes.

Chris Spence, City of Napa resident and member of Napa Climate Now. Our RCAP inventory showed how much CO2 equivalent climate pollutants are due to using natural gas in buildings. So it was very interesting for me to learn that natural gas appliances are also major sources of nitrogen oxide air pollutants. And I'm glad the Air District is moving forward to reduce the source of pollution, especially because in Napa, we have an enclosed valley. And as the days get warmer, the air pollution gets worse. And that really impacts sensitive people in our area. At my house, we installed a heat pump water heater last year. And I love that now I'm heating water with renewable energy because I'm MCE Deep Green. But I love even better that I shut it down when I'm out of town. And so I've seen a big money savings in that regard. And that was something I was not able to do with our gas water heater. So there's an affordability benefit in the operation of it. Thank you.

Thank you. Other public comments?

Good morning. I'm Joyce Kingery, and I'm chair of the League of Women Voters Napa County Climate Change Committee. And in consultation with our executive board, I want to express the League's full support for Rule 9-6, flexibility amendments. The League doesn't advocate for state, local, or regional issues unless the issue has been studied by all League members affected by the action. And we have a public policy position on climate change, and we also have one on environmental protection and pollution control. And of course, this amendment falls very closely within our stated policy positions. Thank you.

Thank you.

Celeste Marisu, and I will be under three minutes. So I support the Air District's 9-6 rule as amended at the May 13th meeting. And I urge the Climate Action Committee to go on record as supporting it as well. Clearly, this is the type of action we need to reduce the impact of climate change by moving away from fossil fuel based appliances towards cleaner energy sources. It will be helpful for the efforts in Napa as well as the broader region. So my husband and I, we have both the heater and the water heater and no problems and really enjoying cleaner house because we don't have that residual gas in the house.

Thank you.

Thank You committee Jim Wilson Napa and Thank You Jennifer Lam for that great talk and for coming up and joining us today We have a house in town We replaced the HVAC system with heat pump HVAC recently we were unable to do the same with our water heater because it's too small for a closet for us to put the heat pump water heater in through that exterior wall and So I didn't hear anything said about that problem. According to my installer, it's a regular problem, where especially if you have an exterior water heater closet, you're talking about removing the door and then cutting out the door jamb as well. So he said, hold on tight. We'll be coming back soon with something that'll fit. And so we're waiting for technology that'll work in our case.

Thank you. Further public comments?

Hi, I'm Linda Brown. I'm a homeowner in Napa. I'm a member of Napa Climate Now and member of the Sierra Club and member of other organizations in the area. I'm so excited for the Bay Area Air District taking leadership on this matter and for Supervisor Gallagher for supporting that at the May meeting or the meetings that happened earlier this spring. I gave public comment there and one of the Comments has to do with the fact that we have an exceedingly high asthma rate here. I think it's 27%, which is higher than the state average by far. And we have, as Chris mentioned, this valley that captures and holds pollution in. You've heard me talk before about the fact that NOx is a precursor gas to ozone formation, which is a powerful super pollutant climate pollutant. So it has that double benefit, and that's not even part of the district's official consideration, but because you're a climate action committee, I think that's a very useful context to consider it in. I want to say I have solar on my roof, and we have last year installed the HVAC system, and we're looking forward to the next step. at the right time. I know there's a burden. It's not going to be the cheapest thing in the world, but I think that I think about this like public health. We do things like we get vaccinated, not just for ourselves, but we do it for the whole community to help the whole community be healthier, which actually is a very important thing to think about from a cost standpoint, the cost of health care for anyone and for people who are particularly vulnerable affects all of us ultimately. So I think we can approach this the same way. It's part of our commitment to public health and to helping those people who have pulmonary diseases that are very expensive or for their children who are suffering. It's just an enormously powerful thing. If I have any more time, I just want to call attention to a couple of the slides that were not presented but were part of the backup slides. I didn't see NAPA listed on the disparities, Jennifer, slide. I don't know. Maybe there was no data. But if you have data available about that, that would be really interesting. And I was also interested to see on the last slide the sources of NOx pollution. In this, the residential is one important area, but there are some other important areas, and I think that opening up this conversation about NOx pollution is an opportunity for us to also begin to look at some of those other areas and how within the RCAP system or other pollution strategies we can start attending to things like heavy-duty trucks. Thank you.

I think you just got it in under the three minutes. Very good. Any other public comments from the audience? Come on up.

Good morning. Good morning. It's great to be here. And I just want to thank all of you for taking the comments today. And in these challenging times, you do not have an easy job. And I really do appreciate it. We may not all agree, but I appreciate the effort you put forward. My name is, again, Rich Richardson. And I'm speaking on behalf of the Napa Sierra Club group in support of Bay Area District Rule 9-6. There's been a lot of discussion about this rule, so it is important to understand what it actually does. Rule 6 does not require anyone to replace an existing water heater. If your water heater is working, you can continue using it. The rule only applies when a new water heater is purchased in the future. It does not affect gas stoves, ovens, dryers, or other household appliances. We support this rule because cleaner air means healthier communities. Many people are surprised to learn that water heaters and heating systems produce a significant amount of air pollution in the Bay Area. That pollution contributes to asthma and other respiratory illnesses, especially among children. seniors, and those with existing health conditions. Reducing these admissions is a practical way to improve public health and quality of life. We also support this rule because the Air District listened to public concerns and made important changes. The rule now includes exemptions and flexibility for low-income homeowners, certain small businesses, emergency situations, and homes facing major electrical challenges. This implementation date has also been delayed until 2027, which was stated earlier. Cost is another common concern. Fortunately, newer heat pump water heaters can often be installed without expensive electrical upgrades, and state and local rebates can help reduce costs for many households. This rule represents a gradual transition as older water heaters reach the end of their useful lives. It is a balanced approach that protects public health while providing flexible and financial assistance. In addition to improving air quality, Rule 9-6 helps move our region toward a cleaner and more sustainable energy future. For those reasons, we respectfully urge the Climate Action Committee and members of the community to support Rule 9-6. And one other thing I would like to add, and this applies across the board, if every solution was perfect, we would never accomplish anything. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Are there any more public comments in the room? If not, are there public comments online?

We have eight callers.

Eight callers. Thank you.

Gerard, you'll have three minutes.

Good morning, committee. My name is Gerard Manning. Jennifer told you about the pollution impact of the gas water heater standards. I'm here to tell you about the really quite amazing climate impact of the standard, which is outside of the mandate of the Air District, but really relevant to you. Stopping pollution from all Bay Area gas water heaters will save over 5 million tonnes of CO2 a year. That's an insanely large number. So let me try and put it in context. Let's say you pledge to never drive a car again, ever, for the climate. Let's say you somehow convince your neighbour to do the same. and another neighbor and another. Well, it would take you convincing one million neighbors to reach that five million tons, more than twice the number of cars in Napa, Sonoma and Solano counties combined. Or consider Marin Clean Energy, a huge pioneer in clean electricity. Over 15 years, they have avoided 550,000 tons of CO2 emissions. So eliminating gas water heaters would do nine times that in just one year. So amazingly, this rule would be like spinning up over 100 MCE-sized CCAs. It's even twice the projected savings of the entire high-speed rail project that costs us $100 billion. And it gets better because CARB is also considering a similar phase out of gas water heaters across the whole state. And at least nine other states are considering doing the same. If the Air District rule goes forward, it will be a huge demonstration that will aid these other jurisdictions. But if we don't, there's almost no hope that these other standards going ahead. After all, if the Bay Area can't lead on climate, who will? We all worry about the climate and threats of a catastrophic future. We do what we can, but it always feels so little. Here, for once in our lifetime, is a chance for the Bay Area to do something so enormous that it dwarfs every other climate action available today and literally has a chance to make a difference on global CO2 emissions. This is tremendous good news, and it shows how critical it is for the Air District to go ahead with their plan and not be sidelined by all the misinformation and AstroTurf lobbying being done by fossil fuel companies and their big business allies that would stop this. Thank you very much.

John, you'll have three minutes.

Hi, can you hear me? Yes. OK, thank you. Well, thank you, NAFTA Climate Committee, for the opportunity to speak. And thank you to the Air District for their presentation and their work. I am a Menlo Park resident. I serve on my city's Environmental Quality Commission. But I'm speaking as an individual today. I just wanted to uplift the Stanford student who commented earlier. I really think about our youth when I think about better air quality and climate action. They've done nothing to create this situation, and they're going to be living with it longer than any of us. So I appreciate you elected leaders doing what we need to do to move things forward. These air district rules have tremendous health benefits and direct climate benefits. I volunteer with an organization called Sunwork. I've helped install over 25 heat pump water heaters. Not one of those installations required a panel upgrade. The company Sunwork has done well over 200 installations without any panel upgrades needed. They install both 120 volt and 240 volt products. My home is fully electric. Heat pump water heater deep pump space heating, induction cooking, clothes drying, EV charging, all on a 100 amp panel. So that is actually not an issue as prevalent as it sometimes is made to seem. I feel like we are ready for this transition and that these rules will accelerate the progress we need to achieve the future for our children and has important near-term benefits for communities that are overburdened by poor air quality. SO AGAIN, THANK YOU FOR THE OPPORTUNITY TO SPEAK. I'M IN FULL SUPPORT OF THE AIR DISTRICT RULES AND THE VERY THOUGHTFUL FLEXIBILITY MEASURES THAT THEY'VE INCORPORATED INTO THE RULES, AND I HOPE THAT THEY MOVE FORWARD ON A TIMELY BASIS, AND I APPRECIATE YOUR COMMITTEE HOPEFULLY SHOWING SUPPORT AS WELL. THANK YOU.

Thank you so much chair and committee members for your work and for the time this morning. My name is Jed with RMI or Rocky Mountain Institute if you've been around the block for a while. We've worked with community members and air district staff on these rules for several years, served with a diverse array of stakeholders in the agency's 18-month implementation working group on the water heater rules, and I'm happy to get to talk about them today because fossil fuel appliance emissions harm the air quality, health, climate, and economy of the Bay Area, and phasing out the sale of NOx-emitting furnaces, water heaters, and boilers in our residential and commercial buildings will be a historic step toward becoming a cleaner, healthier, more prosperous, and more just region. The Bay Area's residential gas appliances alone emit more NOx than all passenger vehicles in the Bay Area. And more than seven times as much NOx as all the power plants in the region combined. I don't think the average person on the street is aware of that. These emissions contribute to the Bay Area's ongoing failure to attain national ambient air quality standards. and cause a tremendous amount of other negative benefits, excuse me, negative impacts. For example, this equipment is also responsible for a full one fifth of the region's GHG emissions, more than our power generation, waste management and agriculture combined. In addition to all the horrendous climate impacts that you all are well aware of, this appliance pollution is insidiously harmful to human health. PM2.5, ozone, and NOx are all associated with respiratory, cardiovascular, cognitive, reproductive, and developmental harms, cancer, and premature death. And this pollution disproportionately impacts communities of color. Nationwide residential gas combustion is associated with a greater disparity of exposure for people of color than any other source studied, higher than power plants, industrial facilities, or vehicles. Air District modeling confirms that PM 2.5 pollution resulting from the covered appliances disproportionately impacts residents of color throughout the nine Bay Area counties as well. For that reason, the proposed rules are a step forward in ensuring safe, healthy homes for all residents, but particularly those in frontline communities who are affected by the intersection of race, disproportionate housing insecurity, increasing cost of living, and harmful indoor pollution. We've worked closely with staff on developing flexibility measures that will exempt folks based on inability to comply, whether because of income or because of electrical or space constraints specific to their project. And those exceptions would be granted by self attestation for ease. But to be clear, there are no exemptions granted from the negative impacts of this pollution. This air pollution and climate pollution is causing injury and death and will cause injury and death. And that is not a consumer choice that any of our neighbors get to make. We hope that you will support this moving forward to join the south coast air quality management district, which already has one rule that has gone into effect for new construction and will go into effect for existing construction in a couple of years and to join the state's agency card, which is pursuing sales targets.

Thank you. I am enforcing the three minute rule. We do have a lot of commenters, so I'm sorry. That's thank you for your comments.

Jodi?

Hi. So Jody Timms with Fairfax Climate Action Committee and 350 Marin. I also want to speak in support of Rule 9-6. And I think I mostly want to mention the issue of affordability because it does come up a lot and is a good reason for people to be concerned and elected. I think it's really important to push for more rebates. I have electrified my home. I cut the cost to do that by a third using a whole slew of stackable rebates, some of which are no longer available. But as we can see, we are really in this transition toward electrification and heat pumps. We need to make it more cost neutral, if at all possible. So I am encouraging MCE to increase the funding that they have set aside for heat pump water heaters, especially for low income folks. But also the state and the federal government, hopefully within the next year or so, will be able to get some more support on that front. Obviously, billionaire individuals and corporations could contribute and help us make this transition, but so far haven't stepped forward. Marin County had the supervisors had an electrified Marin rebate fund that's been exhausted. So we're advocating to increase that. But I think the issue of money is important. Absolutely important. And at the same time, the issue of money, if we're going to be spending nearly $800 million every year for healthcare costs, if we can just get ahead of this and use that money to provide rebates and support for people to make this transition, I think that would be really important. And that's an easier thing to say than do, but I think it's really important. The healthcare costs are really critical. So as I mentioned, our Fairfax Climate Action Committee, maybe I didn't mention this, but our committee is in full support of it. We took it to our town council and asked our council to support it, and they did. I think there are six city or municipal councils that now support it, along with every county is listed except one. if you AI this subject. So I am encouraging you all to support it and to encourage your board representatives to support it, your supervisor and your electeds who are involved I think it's really an important thing to move forward, and I'd love to see your support for it. So thank you again, too, for all the work you do. The long-term effects of climate change, you know, we're getting more aware of them with heat waves and heat domes, et cetera, but putting these things together is hard. It's really the money that most people, I think, say is problematic.

Thank you so much. Thank you for your comments.

Okay, thank you. Okay, bye-bye.

Linda? My name is Linda DiDicchiolo, and I've lived in Napa over 50 years. My PG&E bills became lower after switching from a gas to electric water heater. Because I have solar, my gas portion of my bill was reduced and the electricity portion stayed close to zero. The more gas appliances I replace with electric appliances, the less my total bill is. Also, because I lost my sense of smell and cannot smell gas, I feel much safer with electric appliances, including the water heater. and after knowing that the air pollution in my house has been reduced makes me feel much better so i definitely support this this bill and for all the reasons that people have stated thank you thank you for your comments antoinette

Hello, I am Antoinette Freeman. I am a sustainability coordinator with the City of Sonoma. I wanted to share just a brief summary of what we are experiencing over in Sonoma regarding these new rules. The main challenge, which has been mentioned already, is that the additional cost and complexity some residents are facing for a heat pump water installation. has been difficult. I have heard frustration from some residents and property owners about how difficult it can be to just simply understand the requirements of the new rules and understand what the full project costs are up front, especially when it requires electrical panel upgrades and other compliance-related work. This feedback has stemmed from those with older homes, which there are numerous in the city of Sonoma, as well as multifamily buildings and a few properties with shared electrical infrastructure. And in these cases, Residents have faced added cost delays and confusion for related to panel capacity, HOA and landlord approvals and permitting requirements, as well as contractor coordination. We have had a few contractors that are providing varying and possibly inaccurate information to residents about this role as well, which causes further frustration. And even with a strong rebate, the added electrical costs have been a barrier for some of these residents. In Sonoma County, we have our Bay Ren services and Sonoma County Energy Services who have been able to jump in and help me. and take over communications and assisting with some of these residents, which has been wonderful. But what we're really needing in Sonoma is some sort of simplified resident-facing guidance about what electrical readiness is, what panel upgrade considerations need to be made, what are the cost ranges, and then a list of questions for contractors so that they can be sure that they're asking the right questions and getting the right answers. And when there's escalation needed for some of these residents, it's been great to have Bay Run and Sonoma County Energy Services available, but many do not know that unless they contact the city or me in order for us to direct them. So that would be another public outreach item that we would definitely need in Sonoma.

Thank You Antoinette nice hearing from you again David Thank You David graves here Napa I have a couple of concerns that are that will echo some of the things have already been brought up and It'd be nice to know how many gas water heaters are there in the whole nine-county Bay Area. And if we sort of figured out how many there were and then assigned a sort of a lifespan to them, we can understand what the magnitude of the problem is that we're trying to solve. Second, this program does not address all the multifamily housing problems. units that have gas powered water heaters and gas powered HVAC. Third, I think this is what's touched on by the last speaker, the whole notion of gatekeeping by plumbers and electricians is really an important barrier. Fourth, there should be some If we're going to endorse 120 volt alternatives to the larger, more capable water heaters, I think we ought to have some case studies to understand where those will be suitable and where they won't so that we don't disappoint homeowners who buy them and then find they don't meet their performance requirements. And of course, finally, the financing gap is very large and different CCAs around the Bay Area have very different rebate profiles. There are also some tools like on-bill financing. Cal Green has some 0% financing options potentially. So it will take more than a village to get this done. And it's not simply postponing the rule or giving some exit ramps that will make it work. To avoid pushback, it's important to anticipate problems and deal with them before they occur. They are foreseeable, and we need to be very thoughtful and creative about how to respond to them. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Colleen?

Good morning, chair and committee members. My name is Colleen Corrigan, and I'm here on behalf of SPUR in strong support of these rules. You all have heard a lot about the health and climate benefits today, but I'm also here to talk about affordability. Californians are paying nearly 50% more per unit of gas than five years ago, even as the average household uses 12% less. So demand is falling, but bills are rising. And that's because most of our gas bill isn't paying for gas anymore. It's paying for pipelines and replacement and maintenance of those pipelines. And every time someone buys a new gas appliance, they're locking themselves into decades of subsidizing infrastructure that fewer and fewer people need. And sometimes you end up with stranded assets once someone chooses to fully electrify just years after that gas line was replaced. So these rules are how we stop that cycle. It's clear that these rules are ready to implement. The vast majority of single family homes use less than 50% of their panel's capacity and could install heat pumps without a panel upgrade. Power efficient design strategies and new low voltage heat pump technology that we've talked about today are making that increasingly common. Switching from gas to heat pumps leads to an average bill savings of more than $30 per month on top of the air conditioning that most Bay Area homes desperately need as heat waves intensify. These rules will not only transform the marketplace, but also our region's air quality and people's pocketbooks. The affordability concerns about upfront costs are definitely real, but the exemption framework addresses many of them, including structural constraints. I just want to add that given the closet scenario, a previous commenter mentioned, and the Air District is also working on potential amendments for deed-restricted affordable housing. So we're in full support, and thank you for bringing these rules up for discussion.

Thank you for your comments.

We have no other callers.

Oh. Well, I think then we'll close public comments and move to discussion amongst the members. So, do I? Yes. Member Gallagher.

Thank you. And thank you so much, Ms. Lam, for being here today and helping with the presentation and getting everyone back up to speed. As you can guess, there's been a lot of activity at the Air District and a lot of conversation, a lot of conversation in the public. So we want to make sure. that we are keeping everyone up to date, especially I think everyone in our partner jurisdictions and of course members of the CAC being really important to understand the impacts of the rule. I just wanted to make a couple of clarifying comments. The asthma percentage in Napa County, that's 27% of children. And the state average for kids is 12%. So we do have a higher than average rate of asthma for kids. Also, to clarify that the rule is for the equipment manufactured after January 2027. So that is important to understand. So, there is no desire to try to, you know, ask manufacturers and retailers to, you know, forego the sale of the equipment they already have, obviously, in their inventory. So, they can use their inventory. And yes, I think the caller mentioned, but just to reiterate that space constraints are another one of the possible exemptions. So we have had a lot of conversation about this, as you might guess, at the Air District passed this in 2023 with the specific intent to have a stakeholder working group for the next two years and then to come back and sort of look at what amendments might be needed before putting the rule into implementation. So that is where we got the proposed amendments, which result mostly in exemptions. But one is, as Jennifer alluded, the postponement till potentially October of 2027, but that's a little bit up in the air in terms of the exact date. I think it's also important to understand that with the exemptions, it's estimated that there are probably about 40% of households that will be in a replacement mode that will qualify through 1 of the exemptions. So that is a very large number. However, if we can get to the majority of households, we still have the opportunity to have a really large impact on air quality. So while there will be many, many people who qualify for an exemption or one of the criteria, We still believe we have a lot of low hanging fruit, so to speak. There will be a lot of opportunity to make significant impacts on air quality. Then I did want to also mention that the Air District estimates that there are 120,000 residential water heaters replaced annually in the Bay Area. So it's a really large number. And so we still have an opportunity to get to quite a few of those, not to mention new construction, which will be, of course, fairly easy, I would imagine, to implement for that. So those are just a few comments. And if you have any other questions for me as a board member or as opposed to one of our staff, please feel free. And we are responding to a lot of questions. public comment, a lot of emails and phone calls, both the district and all of the board members as well. So I've had a lot of interest from all over the Bay Area and from Napa residents as well.

Yes, Member Gift.

Well, we're sharing. Sharing is caring, I guess, today. So first of all, thank you so much, staff, for the presentation and all of your hard work on this. And thank you to our board members for everything that you're fielding on this really important topic. So it's really impressive. I wasn't aware that we are one of the first in the nation to move forward with something like this. applause to you. I really support the direction of these proposed rules because, you know, they do seek to both improve the air quality and public health, but also recognize the implementation needs to be both practical and affordable for our residents. However, as you, Chair, Gallagher just mentioned it is important that we continue to clearly communicate that this is not an overnight mandate and what rebates are currently available and will become available. As we all know and go back to our respective districts and towns, Unfortunately, changes, new concepts and new policy are often met with confusion that can linger extensively in the public. So clear communication combined with just continued incentive information and how that practical implementation is going to look, which I think is very clear to us here today, but just continued education to the community and will help continue building that public trust while achieving the air quality and public health benefits that these rules are really intended to provide. So thank you all for your hard work.

Yes. Member Painter.

Thank you. I just want to echo, first of all, thank you for coming and giving us this really good presentation, and thank you to Member Gallagher for all of your time. I'm sure it's significant on the ear board, and I just want to express my appreciation for that. I think Member Giff just really sort of echoed where I am with this. I think the benefits are really enormous. I know we have had some members who have asked us to vote or take a position today. I don't think that we've agendized it specifically to be able to do that today, but given the timeline that was given to us, which looks like, and also we don't actually have the document in front of us that's going to be here within the next number of days or weeks. But I do think it would be important to bring this back potentially for this board or maybe for all of our local jurisdictions to consider once we actually have the document. It looks like, based on your timeline, approval is for November of 2026. So I think we have time to do that, and I think it's important that we take back to our jurisdictions that we want to consider bringing this to our councils and boards. And also, just to be fair, I think we need to notice it properly to be able to take that action. So I don't want you to think that we haven't heard you on taking that action, but I think we should explain why. I serve also as a director on the board of MCE as does Member Alessio. MCE has a very robust page that explains various rebates. And I would really encourage you to take a look at them now because we kind of need to do two things at one time, right? We need to consider this rule. We need to do that due diligence on what it's going to do. But we can't stop our efforts to look at how we expand or educate the community on rebates that are available, how we continue to collect the data that was described by many of the callers in terms of cost, in terms of physical constraints and i think you know i just want to reinforce the importance of educating the community because particularly with water heaters which i mentioned already before i think you know many folks don't it's kind of out of sight out of mind people don't tend to replace their water heaters until they break and that's you know that's human nature you know we all have a lot of things we need to be spending money on But there is an opportunity for education to encourage folks to look at how old their water heater is. If it's, for example, more than 10 years old, you know, can we create programs to incentivize and encourage folks to do these replacements sooner rather than later? So I would like to see the education piece move forward regardless of how the rules all fall out because this is really important work. And those are my comments today. Thank you again for being here.

member lemon Tina yes Oh remember Joseph first of all I would echo director painters comment about bringing it back for formal action because I do think it's an important policy and and I certainly appreciate the presentation and all the information I think for me the focal point is what one of the speakers referred to as the gatekeeper function Plumbers and electricians, we really need to focus on educating them on what the options are, what the standards, exemptions, et cetera, et cetera, because I'm a little worried about self-certification. Sometimes if my water heater breaks and I want to get my kids bathed by that evening, I'm not really concerned about a lot of the details. Whatever will get me my gas water heater as fast as I can, that's what I'll sign. it would be nice if when they call the plumber electrician to come out and fix my problem that they are the ones that are going to say all right you know you have whatever exemption applies versus no you can do it and then it gets into cost and that's where i think there's been a lot of discussion we really have to figure out how to bring that cost down and rebates is certainly a way older homes i think are always going to be a problem just because They weren't built for an electric world. So for me, it's very encouraging. I think the policy issue is to the extent we have a lot of exemptions, we get less benefit. And so if we can address a lot of those benefits through gatekeepers who know the difference, I think that will help. So I'd like to see this come back at a future meeting just to formally take action on it. Thank you.

Thank you.

My concern is say my water heater goes out and I don't have enough money to upgrade and my typical water heater is no longer available to me. So there I feel like some people will go without hot water because they can't afford to upgrade or replace. So I just want to keep those folks in mind. They're kind of in a gap situation where they can't really afford to upgrade. For instance, I've gone without a working heater for five years. I just decided I don't need it. I'm trying to remodel my house, get solar and all that. So I just go without. just my son and me. We survive. We don't need a heater. But I'm thinking about the hot water situation where I know many folks will go without. So what do we do to kind of bridge that gap? Thank you.

Okay. Just a couple of comments. One, oh, I'm sorry. All right. I don't, first, I believe that exemption enforcement will be problematic for you. I don't have an answer, but I hope that the Bay Area District will look at that and try to figure out the best way to go. And as there was a comment previously, if we wait for perfect, nothing will ever happen. The other thing I would like to say is I think you can take the comments that you've heard as well as the very existence of the RCAP as an optimistic look at how the committee might vote in the future about endorsing the plan. And the last thing is, so the Bay Area District was formed in 1955. So was I, and so was Disneyland. So you're in good company. Member Alicio.

Thank you, and thank you for everybody's comments up here and for public comment, both in the chambers and the callers. There's a lot of intelligence and wisdom and care here and insight, and I greatly appreciate that. What I think what I'm hearing is a couple things, which we've known, but I think is being restated, is how closely climate change ties with public health and ties with equity. And right now, the biggest issue here in terms of equity is that cost factor. And also maybe just the misunderstanding or not having a clear understanding of what might be available. And so that will just have to be something that we can all continue to educate on. But we're looking at the biggest gap here, which is the affordability issue, which is real, right, for a lot of families, single parents, a lot of families in general. We need to address that because we need to address the entire problem here. And, you know, to hear that there's how many will be like 40% or I can't remember a high number that you mentioned here. member Gallagher, in terms of those meeting the exemption, it doesn't meet the problem at hand fully. So what I ask is, I ask that if you would reach out, or I'll reach out, I'm on the board of MCE, as is member Painter, see if you can do a presentation. MCE represents four counties. We can do some grants, it can't happen overnight. But we can advocate after we inform the entire committee, which is 34 members representing those four counties, to see if we can't use whether it be some surplus funds or some grant funding for the next year. But it's going to take some time and strategy to be able to bring those funds forward to help those communities, right, to help our residents and these communities. I also ask that we reach out to PG&E. I just think we have to be strategic about addressing the affordability issue. So what can PG&E do? What can all the CCAs do in the Nine Bay areas? Because I don't want us to jump ahead and create additional hardship for people. I understand there are exemptions, but the cost is the major problem, which is, you know. So we know what the right thing to do. We know what the impact, positive impact will be when we get there, but also it will not happen overnight. just as certain water heaters will go out every year and they need to be replaced, this can happen over time. So I think that if we both say there's a strategy in terms of addressing the affordability issue, and this is not a one-year issue, this is not happening overnight, this is going to be 10, maybe 20 years. I don't know how long water heaters last anymore. But, you know, the life... That long, okay. So this is over 20 years, and there is a safety net, financial safety net for people. Maybe the exemption is first phase, and then the second phase is having dollars in hand, maybe from BACWA, the state, different CCAs, PG&E. It's kind of like all hands on deck. We need a row in the same direction at the same time. So thank you for this presentation, and I look forward to inviting you, and I'll talk with the MC staff of having you present MCE.

Yes, go ahead, please.

I also just want to note PG&E is on our implementation working group, so we're working with them, as well as a lot of CCA staff, including MCBs, so happy to do so.

Excellent. Are they giving you money?

They have their own incentive programs as well as programs like on bill financing and things like that.

So I think it would be helpful in the next presentation that you show those financial opportunities for people that need them. Because I think it's great that they're on board, that's huge, that's step one. But then we also need to back it up with money. Thank you.

Member Reeves?

I just wanted to agree with all the comments about the need for education and the public health benefits versus the affordability factors and all that thing. But I am the most concerned about the gatekeeper question. I'm wondering if you have considered the sort of similar process of the gatekeepers actually being the clearinghouse for the rebates because it worked really well with electric cars that way and I'm thinking that if we don't give the gatekeepers some kind of incentives to sell These heat pump water heaters that that we won't actually get that to happen So that's my comment Okay.

Yeah, so I'm from context from the conversations. We're talking about contractors and that when you speak about gatekeepers Yeah, so a lot of contractors are getting educated on this through the incentive programs. They are the people that sort of hold a the application for that for a lot of the biggest programs, like Clean California, as well as CCA programs. And that's been a really, really helpful gateway for us to sort of get to these contractors that have already done voluntary installations, to then do education with them on our rules. We're continuing to do a series of those education initiatives with contractors, sort of meeting them where they're at, at training facilities, at different places like that, with their unions, that sort of thing, to speak with them. So we've done a few. We have a bunch more on the calendar, and that's contracted through the Building Decarbonization Coalition specific to contractors.

Okay. Thank you. Oh, sorry.

Yeah, and I'll just add to that. Sorry.

All right. Wasn't sure what you were signaling, but you do want to speak. Go ahead, Mr. Melendez. Thank you, Chair.

Yes. I'd just like to add to that that there's also a working group with Bayrin led by the San Francisco Environment Department that is working on what we're calling a Sprint to 9-6 education campaign and training campaign for contractors in the Bay Area. So I think we've held maybe four or five, maybe six trainings in various counties. We held one early on for the North Bay counties back in January or February in Petaluma in partnership with Marin and Sonoma counties. We're hoping to do another one kind of Napa and maybe Solano focused here to get contractors trained not only educated on the 9-6 rules themselves. Many of the times in speaking with contractors, they aren't aware of these rules yet. And so it's kind of the first step in getting contractors educated, you know, these gatekeepers educated in what's to actually come. But then many of the trainings actually do some hands-on trainings with the equipment themselves so that if contractors haven't even seen a heat pump water, you know, what the technology is, how they can install it. We're partnering with many of the manufacturers of the equipment to actually do kind of hands-on education. with them as well. So more to come. We have some residential workshops again coming up focused in American Canyon and throughout these workshops we're now including educational components of these rules so that residents are aware but also really needing to make sure that contractors are engaged and participating as well. So I just wanted to add that.

Thank you. So thank you to all of the commenters both in our audience online and here on the committee and especially thank you to Ms. Lam. That was a wonderful presentation and I urge you to stay in contact with staff as you make progress and we're able to plan on a future agenda item when we see you again and we will agendize a vote. Okay, obviously this was a popular item. I think it's my longest agenda item since I've been here, but it shows the enthusiasm of people. We do have other items, and it is actually my great pleasure to invite up from Calistoga, Chair of our Green Committee, Antoinette Maillard, and Associate Planner for the City of Calistoga, Lauren Clark, who will do a presentation on the progress that's being made in Calistoga. I guess it's Lauren first.

Yes. My name is Lauren Clark, as you said. I'm assistant planner for the city of Calistoga. This is my first time being here in person, but I've watched you all online for a little while. It's such an interesting meeting. I'm glad I'm here in person to witness this. It's very fascinating. Like you said, Chair of the Green Committee is here, Chair Maillard. She will be presenting after me to share what the Green Committee is working on and what may come before the council pretty soon. But today I am giving an overview of what the city has done in recent years, including incentives, ordinances adopted, infrastructure installed, changes to the operations of the city, permitting activity, water conservation, waste reduction, and adaptation work. So Calistoga has adopted a climate action plan back in 2014. The plan established a local greenhouse gas reduction target of 15% below to the 2005 levels by 2020 and organized reduction strategies around transportation, energy efficiency, renewable energy, carbon sense equation, water conservation, waste reduction, and community engagement. In 2021, the city council adopted a resolution declaring a climate emergency and committed the city to a goal of net zero climate pollution by 2030. Calistoga has diligently been working towards this goal ever since. And I'll begin by talking about energy and resilience. In 2021, the council moved to moved to an all municipal electric account with MCE's Deep Green Energy Service, which is MCE's 100% renewable energy electricity option. The resolution estimated that the opt-up would reduce municipal carbon dioxide emissions by 13,000 pounds annually. And in 2025, the city council approved energy efficiency upgrades for the city-owned facilities, including city hall, the police station, fire station, and many other city facilities. The energy retrofit was completed in 2025, and the estimated annual reductions include 41 metric tons of carbon dioxide and approximately 55,000 kilowatt hours of electricity. Another major resilience project in the city is the Calistoga Resiliency Center, which is a very interesting project that is almost complete, a hybrid hydrogen and battery energy storage project designed to supply 48 hours of continuous clean power to the majority of Calistoga's commercial and residential districts during a PSPS event. The city has also coordinated with MCE on other resources and clean energy programs, rebates, and community sponsorship opportunities. At the private property level, the city of Calistoga has issued 189 solar permits over the past five years and has streamlined solar permitting. Next, I'll talk about transportation and land use. In 2021, Calistoga adopted an ordinance that prohibits gas station and land use to incentivize zero-emission vehicle charging stations. The ordinance amended the definitions, commercial zoning districts, parking regulations, and general provisions. The existing gas station sites are limited to changes including work-related soil, groundwater, and storm water quality, traffic safety, battery charging stations, hydrogen fuel, and commercial uses are not related to fossil fuel sales. As of January 2026, Calistoga's EV charging inventory includes three level two charge points with four charging ports. The city has also made active transportation improvements downtown. In 2024, an unused parklet on Washington Street was converted into a protected bike parking that accommodates up to 16 bicycles, including a sidewalk bench and provided downtown district some access to bike parking. And a lighthearted note is more recently the bike parklet received public art update made by a resident student. And it looks great. The police department is establishing a bicycle program with two officers assigned as a collateral duty. The program is intended for areas where vehicle access is limited, restricted, or less practical, including special events in pedestrian-heavy areas. Another air quality action is the gas-powered leaf blower ordinance. So Calistoga prohibits gas-powered leaf blowers within the city limits and regulates any kind of gas-powered leaf blowers. The ordinance was paired with a rebate program for electric input and was used by 59 participants, including 51 residents and eight commercial businesses. Waste reduction has been one of the more detailed local regulations. In 2023, Calistoga adopted a reusable foodware and waste reduction ordinance. The ordinance requires reusable foodware for on-premise dining with limited exemptions for takeout, delivery, and curbside pickup. The reusable ordinance also advises they must meet the ordinance's standards for usable, compostable, otherwise acceptable materials. The ordinance also regulates disposable accessories, condiments, and requires accessories to be provided only upon request and prohibits polyurethane foodware. Together, the foodware ordinance and the organics regulations address both materials being distributed and how those materials are sorted after use. Water conservation has included both drought response and ongoing rebate programs. During stage two water emergency, Calistoga achieved approximately 14% water conservation, including annual use by 90 acre feet. Water supply conditions later improved, but the city continues to offer water conservation tools. Cash for grass program provides rebates for moving irrigated turf and replacing with low water use plants or permeable hardscape. the city offers rebates for high efficiency clothes washers and water sense toilets adaptation work remains part of the city's local climate record calistoga's recent wildfire related work includes defensible space weed abatement fire hazard planning and emergency preparedness activities the The city also adopted fire hazard severity zone maps and local responsibility areas, which inform local planning and building requirements, including wildland urban interface standards for new construction and designated zones. Recent private development also contributed to the implementation of the city's circulation and active transportation goals. For example, Lincoln Avenue Apartments, which includes 78 affordable units, which were completed last year. Earlier this year, the city also approved the Upper Valley Health Center and Health Clinic that will front Lincoln Avenue. Projects like these have been conditioned to construct street frontage improvements, sidewalks, multi-use pathways, and to implement applicable components of Calistoga's active transportation plan. These conditions are one way of the city connects private development approvals with public infrastructure improvements. By directing new housing community serving areas to infill locations, these projects also support more walkable development pattern to help implement the city's active transportation network. And I'll close with the Green Committee's role. The Green Committee advises the city on environmental sustainability, greenhouse gases reduction, carbon cessation, and climate adaptation. Many of the actions I mentioned in this report were initiated or supported by the Green Committee. With limited staff at the City of Calistoga, I am very happy to have them, and they've been essential to the work in Calistoga. So with that, I invite Antoinette Maillard to discuss the current work of the Green Committee. Thank you.

Thank you all for inviting us to come. I'm Antoinette Maillard, the chair of the Calistoga Green Committee and have been the chair since it was reconstituted quite a long time ago. Your esteemed chair, Mr. Eisenberg, is our particularly assigned to us council member who shows up at most of our meetings. And we're always glad to have his often humorous input in our meetings. I'd like to offer a short description, and I would like to say that Lauren is just a huge asset for us, and as she said, a large number of the items that she mentioned were initiated and framed and official drafts presented by this all-volunteer committee that I chair. It's just a remarkable group of people that really do what in most places would be considered staff work. I'm just going to offer there, we have about five things in our pipeline at the moment that we hope to have completed by the end of the year. I can go over the others if you want, but there are three that I thought might be of particular interest. The first one is what's commonly known as dark sky regulation. This would establish standards and policy governing artificial nighttime lighting. As probably everybody here is fully aware, inappropriate lighting can have a profound adverse effect on everything from bird migration to the breeding process. patterns of animals as varied as frogs and mosquitoes. It interferes with normal predator-prey relationships among mammals, insects, even invertebrates. This was just so eye-opening to me. If you think about the creatures that eat other creatures, if you mix up daytime and nighttime, you will find fewer pollinators, for example, because you'll have an additional army of predators that can go after them. So there are things that are so far-reaching that you don't think of until you start digging into this kind of thing. Not incidentally, excess use of night sky, of night lighting is very wasteful environmentally. Not to mention the fact that it is a frequent source, I have been told over and over again, of conflict between neighbors. The next item I want to mention is a little bit more complex that's on our agenda at the moment. It's a set of regulations based on a practice often called integrated pest management, IPM. The goal of IPM is to prohibit or severely limit the use of the most harmful herbicides and pesticides, the most egregious of which are chemicals with the completely unpoetic names glyphosates, neonicotinoids, and trifluralin. To describe the horrors associated with these chemicals would take a lot more time than you would want me to spend up here. So I have lots of detail. If you're interested, I would be glad to answer questions. The challenge of legislating on this particular topic is, according to what we have been told by the leader of a nationwide environmental organization, Monsanto has succeeded in convincing over 40 state legislatures, including California, to permit cities and counties, etc., to ban the use of these chemicals on property that they own and or control, but prohibits them from banning the sale and use of these toxins by private citizens in their jurisdiction. So while we are pretty confident that the city of Calistoga will outlaw the use of these chemicals on city property. They don't have the option to ban it currently for private citizens. That's something I hope that people at the county level will consider talking to people at the state level about. The third topic I thought might be of interest to you is low-carbon concrete, LCC. It turns out that concrete is responsible for approximately 8% of global CO2 emissions. The guilty substance in concrete is cement. It happens that there are now several methods for replacing cement with other substances, slag or fly ash, what is called mineralization injection. There are a number of different methods. While these technologies have been available for a while, it has not always been, in the final analysis, a green solution because there were so few manufacturers that the products had to be shipped from very long distances, which kind of defeats some of the purpose of minimizing environmental damage. Now it happens that there are at least two good suppliers locally right here in Santa Rosa And we have confirmation from scientific organizations that these sustainable alternatives are as strong as and as durable as the old products that contained large quantities of cement. I have found today's conversation absolutely riveting, and I'm so appreciative of having been invited on this day to hear what went on, but also to hear that the problems that you are facing with this new initiative that was discussed today are very many of them are the same worries and problems that we have had in legislation planning and managing to present to our council. When we did the foodware and waste reduction ordinance, we had vendors who were lying to their consumers, to the restaurants and hotels that are in our district, telling them that things were compostable, telling them that things were recyclable, when in fact they were not. Our upper valley waste disposal company that services our town has improved their rules, but we wrote that legislation to match their regulations and capabilities at the time. Those have morphed, and we are now presenting to our city council, I think in the next couple of weeks, some amendments. The thing that was most impressive about your worries and concerns for me was your recognition of the need for education. Enforcement as well, of course. The people who obstruct and refuse once they are fully educated on the matter of what is expected, who simply bald-faced won't do it. requires that cities and counties invest in a way for citizens to report and, with warnings and rewarnings and third-time warnings, be willing to execute some kind of penalties on the people who just will not conform. But most important of all, I think, are those who are seriously conscientious and want to conform and want to comply to make sure that they have available what they need to be educated and updated. Before we did that particular one I was mentioning, the foodware and waste reduction, we spent, before we even brought it anywhere near the city council, We met with every business owner in Calistoga personally more than once that was willing to meet with us. We asked their input. We told them where we were headed with this thing. When it was finally passed, we allowed a full year for restaurants and others to, grocery stores and so on, before it actually took effect. We held workshops. We had bullet lists of the key points. And even that, I have to say, has not been enough over the long term. I think it was extremely helpful at the time, but I think communities need to recognize that staying on top of community upgrading and updating and information is really critical because the people who want to do the right thing need to know what it is. Something as simple as what thing goes in what bin. It seems simple, but it isn't if people don't know. So that would be my advice to you is to take that part of it very seriously. And I also like to say I'm just wildly impressed with what's going on here. It's very, very impressive. And I'd be glad to answer any questions if anybody has any.

All right, let's begin with any clarifying questions from the committee. All right, do we have any public comments? That was very well said. I just want to, I'm sorry, we do have public comments. Excuse me for interrupting. I thought it was just this thunderous applause.

Jim Wilson, Napa. Thank you again, Chair Eisenberg and committee. I just want to say thank you, Calistoga, for your leadership. And I've been involved in this for a little while, and I've been coming to these meetings the best I can. But let me say that when it comes to Antoinette Maillard and her team, I've been to several meetings. They are inspiring, and especially for me because I was kind of there at the time when that team was transitioned by you, City Council, to a climate focus. there's nothing else like it in the valley. Let me just put it that way. I mean a lot of us try but nothing comes close to Calistoga's enthusiasm and depth. I've seen these folks driving through town on street corners doing what Antoinette's describing, okay, meeting with everybody and it's exciting because I saw it actually work from the day that Gary Krause Krause sitting here on this on this committee said we're reconstituting this team as a climate committee to drive the awkward conversation about the climate emergency and you can see what has flowed from that thank you very much Calistoga thank you for those comments yes

We, okay. Go ahead, you have your time. We're on a tight schedule, so as concise as possible.

Last night, the Calistoga Fairgrounds Advisory Committee had a presentation from Global Slack, or Stack, rather. And I bring this up now because the Green Committee is looking at strategies and implementing strategies. And I don't know if they're aware that GlobalStack is proposing a data center at the fairgrounds in Calistoga. And I urge you to go look at their presentation that was on the agenda last night. And it's pretty shocking. It would be helicopter ports and a five-story parking facility. and a massive data center. And as you well know, data centers are extremely demanding on water. And we know that the Napa River is struggling due to low flows. Groundwater depletion is an issue. Our groundwater resources have been depleting for years, and they are not recharging the way they should. And I can't even imagine a data center being in Cali.

I just want to say, I totally understand what you're saying. There are lots of reasons that things get on agendas, but it is a non-starter in Calistoga. It is absolutely opposed by the Fairgrounds Committee, the people of Calistoga, and the City Council. And the only reason I interrupt is we're on a tight schedule and I don't- I'm done. Okay.

Thank you.

We're really going to need to move the next agenda item to the next meeting. Are there any last minute comments that we need to make? I think we've already communicated we want to bring back the air quality discussion at a future meeting. Are there any other quick? Yes.

I'd like to throw, I don't know about the next meeting, but something talking about the burn piles and how we can address some of the obstacles to getting that to a more green standard than burning.

I would support that.

Yes, so would I. That would be a good item. All right. Any other things that need to be said before the gavel bangs? Yes.

I'll just report announcements real quick. We have two upcoming workshops in the City of American Canyon on July 22nd and July 29th. Both are from 6 to 7 p.m. at the American Canyon Library. They're Wednesday nights, July 22nd, 29th. The topics will be simple energy savings at homes on the 22nd, and the 29th will be what's the deal with heat pumps. So you can come learn about heat pumps and the Rule 9-6 rules. Yeah, come on out. All right. Thank you.

Can I make a super quick announcement? MCE just completed a workshop regarding energy procurement, and there's a subsequent workshop that will be July 8th. It's very information dense.

I'm just warning you.

But it's very interesting if you're interested in how renewable energy is purchased and distributed through our MCE region.

Anyone else? Because this hits heads also. I guess not. At 11.33, meeting adjourned.