Coloradans need a smart, balanced and cost-effective approach toward reducing the state’s carbon footprint. That includes giving high priority to consumers’ interests in any strategy moving forward. It also means avoiding untested, risky and costly policies while Colorado’s energy use evolves.

One risky and costly initiative now under consideration by our state’s policy makers would in fact backfire in a big way. It’s the headlong rush to mandate the total electrification of Colorado homes.

It amounts to a de facto ban on residential natural gas – the backbone of home heating across our state and nation. That not only would make it difficult and much more expensive to heat our homes, but it also would micromanage basic household amenities like how we cook dinner and even heat our water to take a shower.

The consequence would be to drive up the cost of buying or renting a place to live in our state – amid what is already a historic shortage of affordable housing.

A radical shift toward total reliance on electricity for our homes also would place an unprecedented and simply unsustainable burden on our state and region’s power grid. There just isn’t enough electrical infrastructure to generate or carry that much more power to Colorado residents.

Natural gas long has been a mainstay for meeting Colorado’s energy needs. It is plentiful in our state, relatively inexpensive and highly practical. That’s why it has become a cornerstone of Colorado’s energy economy. It also is a key component of a next-generation energy portfolio for Colorado; it burns far cleaner than coal and has a much lower impact on the climate as well as everyday air quality.

Colorado’s energy regulator, the Public Utilities Commission, has been weighing a big policy change to make it costlier for gas lines to be extended to new homes and businesses. That, too, would add to the cost of new homes served by natural gas – or, more likely, dissuade builders from connecting them to gas altogether.

Once mandated, electrification would take a big toll on ratepayers’ pocketbooks, as well. Using electricity alone to heat, cook and warm water is a lot more expensive than natural gas. It will cost $746 on average nationwide to heat homes with natural gas this winter; those who use electric heat will spend $1,268, according to the Energy Information Administration’s Winter Fuels Outlook.

Current home heating technology cannot accommodate electrification, either. Heat pumps – touted by electrification boosters – work well enough in temperate climates like southern California’s. Not here. Natural gas heating is essential to efficiently and effectively heat homes in Colorado’s cold winters – all the more so in our state’s high-elevation mountain communities that experience many deep-freeze days in the winter.

Nor can the energy grid sustain full electrification. Just look at California’s rolling blackouts in 2020’s summer heat wave across the western United States. The state had ditched gas-fired power plants in recent years in favor of renewable energy – causing supply crunches on hot evenings when solar production tapers off. Colorado, like most states, just doesn’t have the generating capacity.  According to a Wall Street Journal article, Xcel is now working on contingency plans to ensure adequate supplies for next summer. 

All of which makes clear the following: consumers deserve a choice. And they want one. More than eight out of 10 Coloradans want options, not mandated electric heating and appliances, according to a March 2022 study by Keating Research of 800 adults living across Colorado. Nearly six in 10 customers wouldn’t move from gas to electric even to reduce emissions.

No one has done an analysis to evaluate the resource adequacy of Colorado’s grid or the costs of full electrification on our utilities, builders, homeowners and tenants. Stakeholders and regulators should be operating from a shared set of facts before we continue to adopt policies that outpace our capacity and cost more.

The price of mandated electrification is high, and consumers don’t want it. Our housing market can’t take it, and neither can our energy grid. But will our policy makers listen?

Ted Leighty is CEO of the Colorado Association of Home Builders.