The future of home heating and cooling in California is looking a whole lot greener thanks to the latest building code proposal from regulators. In a big win for the climate, new efficiency rules will mean the vast majority of new homes and buildings are built with heat pumps rather than gas starting in 2026.
Let that sink in. Just a few years ago, California was adding more new gas customers than anywhere in the nation besides Texas. Now the state is poised to course-correct in a huge way to stem the tide of fossil fuel lock-in. This code blazes the trail for emissions-free heating and cooling across California’s new housing stock.
But the draft also contains a glaring missed opportunity when it comes to cutting pollution from existing homes. The proposed code scrapped a critical provision included in a previous draft that would have encouraged households statewide to install…