So there you have it. H.157 will undermine the Clean Heat Standard by reducing the number of workers available who have the expertise to install heat standard friendly heat pumps, solar water heaters and the like.
H.157 would create a fee-based registry for Vermont’s small contractors, based on the theory that home improvement fraud is a massive problem and consumers don’t have a good way to protect themselves.
The question the Vermont Climate Council and legislators are attempting to answer using schemes like the CHS is not, “How do we heat homes and power cars without fossil fuels?” Rather it’s, “How do we get most Vermonters to live in smaller homes and drive fewer cars?”
The Vermont Climate Council is holding public forums on April 12 and April 13 to share information about its ongoing work and to hear from Vermonters across the state. Vermont’s Initial Climate Action Plan (CAP) was adopted on December 1, 2021.
The lightbulb went off over the heads of the members of the Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee that the Clean Heat Standard bill only deals with thermal emissions. Not transportation emissions as well. This did not go down well.
“Anyone that sells an electron, produces an electron, counts an electron, distributes an electron or sells a device that needs electrons, they are winning, big time,” Cota said. “Who are the losers? Don’t look that far.”
How is the PUC going to be able to verify that these half a million actions take place all over the state, assign a unique credit value and shelf life to each, and broker sales, track the ownership of, and then retire those credits when they expire?
The planning director for the Vermont Department of Public Service told the Senate Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday that while some estimates can be made, officials ultimately don’t know the impact a clean heat standard will have on Vermonters.
The good news is that the administration seems to be laying the groundwork for a potential veto of the clean heat standard if it doesn’t contain a second vote threshold. The bad news is, many members of the Scott administration have been advocates for the CHS.
Part of your prescription for reducing Vermont’s carbon footprint is continued subsidies for electric cars. Over that last year, the average price of gasoline here has gone from $2.72 to $4.34/gallon. Isn’t that incentive enough?
H.715, an act relating to the clean heat standard, passed in the State House of Representatives on March 16,2022, by a vote of 96-44.
Even if homeowners enthusiastically embrace new, unproven heating systems and fuel sellers join the fight against climate change, the Clean Heat Standard will strafe one final group of Vermonters before its destruction is complete: taxpayers.