THE CITY OF SAN CARLOS ADOPTS AN ALL-ELECTRIC REACH CODE

After 18 months of advocacy led by a handful of San Carlos residents, the City of San Carlos adopted an all-electric reach code at the San Carlos City Council meeting on January 25th.

Over the course of a year, the local advocacy team built a loose-knit network of volunteers and activists from the Citizen’s Climate Lobby, Sierra Club, Fossil Free Buildings Silicon Valley, progressive activists, Climate Reality Leader Kathleen Goforth, and neighbors, to help strategize, write emails, sign group letters, and/or speak at City Council meetings.

Educating and building relationships with City Council members was crucial to make this happen.  This effort included sending information about the benefits of electrification, updates on other cities' reach codes, announcements of workshops about heat pumps, links to YouTube videos of induction cooking demos, news reports about the climate crisis, and more.

After a draft of an all-electric reach code was defeated at an earlier Council meeting, City staff were directed to conduct public outreach, gather public input, and return with a revised proposal in a few months. A public survey was posted on the City's website in early December.  The small but mighty team of volunteers prepared a Q&A document about reach codes and building electrification. They then engaged their networks to distribute it to likely supporters, along with a link to the city's survey.

This led to an invitation for Climate Reality Leader Kathy to participate in a "Climate Change and Wildfire" virtual coffee panel hosted by a city council member. The panel highlighted building electrification as an important climate mitigation strategy. Kathy sent a detailed follow-up to the team’s network for their support.

After much discussion at the public hearing on January 25th, the Council voted unanimously to adopt the all-electric reach code below.

All "newly constructed buildings” which includes both brand new buildings AND construction projects where over 50% of the building's foundation or framing is removed/replaced must be All-Electric, with the following exceptions:

- Laboratory areas within non-residential buildings may have non-electric space conditioning systems if the applicant provides third party verification that the All-Electric space heating requirement is not cost effective and feasible.

- For-profit restaurants and employee kitchens (which means large employee cafeteria-like facilities, not employee break rooms) may apply for and be granted a modification to install gas-fueled cooking appliances IF they can demonstrate to the Building Official a business-related reason to cook with a flame that cannot reasonably be achieved with an electric appliance. 

- Single-family residential buildings (which includes duplexes but not residential buildings or developments with 3 or more units) may contain non-electric cooking appliances and fireplaces. Council will revisit this exception in 1 year.

- ADUs and JDUs that are attached to existing homes with gas infrastructure are not required to be All-Electric (detached ADUs are required to be All-Electric); and

- Exceptional circumstances in which technical infeasibility or the applicant's civil rights or disability necessitates the use of gas appliances may be excepted via an appeals process.

Any project granted any of the above exceptions must comply with pre-wiring requirements.  In addition, the Council committed the City to work with PCE to do public outreach and education about building electrification.

The ordinance will soon be submitted to the CEC for approval.