You may remember a victory we celebrated earlier this year when the Washington State Buildings Code Council (SBCC) passed the most climate-friendly building codes in the nation! Starting in July 2023, all new commercial and large multifamily buildings will be required to be built with high-efficiency electric heat pumps for water and space heating. Over 300 people of faith joined us in asking for these strong protections – thank you!
Now we have an opportunity to advocate for the same climate-friendly building codes to be applied to new residential and small multifamily buildings. Sign Earth Ministry/WAIPL’s faith community letter today asking the SBCC to say no to fracked gas and yes to electrification of future homes!
We know that continued dependence on polluting fossil fuels, especially fracked gas, is not faithful. Enduring existence of fracked gas infrastructure in buildings will increase indoor air pollution and subsequent health risks, perpetuate reliance on dirty fossil fuels, promote more fracking (often on Indigenous lands,) and exacerbate our changing climate that already weighs most heavily on those on the margins – read more here.
We have a moral obligation to address historic and enduring inequalities caused by pollution, many of which are crystallized in fossil fuel infrastructure. Electrifying new buildings is an important, values-aligned investment that will both improve community health and move us toward Washington’s goal of being carbon neutral by 2050. Planning for electric heat pumps in all new homes is especially timely since buildings are our state’s fastest growing source of climate pollution and we only update building energy codes every three years.
Join the Earth Ministry/WAIPL community in speaking out for clean buildings by signing our letter before October 14th. If you want to share your support verbally, you can join us at a hearing happening both online and in-person in Olympia at 10am on Oct 14 – just reply to this email for more info.