We have no problem with Coloradans continuing to use their natural gas furnaces, hot water heaters and stoves. But should we have a constitutionally guaranteed right to access natural gas in our homes? Should the Colorado Constitution also guarantee the right of utilities to provide natural gas to customers?
Simply put, we think it’d be a mistake – a slippery slope for special interests — to make it a guaranteed right to purchase any single consumer product. Whatap next, putting nicotine products into the Constitution alongside frequently banned books and single-use plastic bags?
We urge voters to say “no” to Colorado’s proposed Amendment 82 in November. A no vote will prevent minutiae from polluting our Constitution. Just because something might seem like the right idea now doesn’t mean it will continue to be in the ever-evolving energy landscape.
The ballot initiative was sparked after Colorado lawmakers and local elected officials began what the industry terms “the war on gas.”
In Colorado, the effort to push consumers away from appliances that use natural gas and toward appliances that use electricity has been slowly building for years. The reasons for the push are two-fold: first, natural gas is predominantly made up of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that, when burned, produces carbon dioxide, a less-potent greenhouse gas. Second, the emissions released inside homes from furnaces, stoves and hot water heaters can be harmful to humans, especially children, and especially if not properly ventilated.
In that vein, Democrats in the Colorado Capitol have passed a law requiring a warning on gas appliances about emissions. In a separate attack on propane appliances (which oddly is a less harmful alternative to natural gas in many ways not protected by this constitutional amendment), the state mandated strict emissions guidelines only to quickly roll them back.
Local lawmakers have also considered, and some have passed, building codes requiring new construction to use electric appliances instead of gas.
And finally, Colorado passed a law prohibiting Xcel Energy from penalizing or charging customers who want to end their natural gas service completely.
We can see why the natural gas industry feels as though it is under attack and why a utility such as Xcel might worry they will be on the hook for obsolete infrastructure no one is using.
But none of those concerns warrant a constitutional amendment protecting the use of natural gas.
We think the goal of beneficial electrification is a good one, even if we think bans on gas appliances and new gas hookups go too far too fast.
If anything, we think a wise amendment aimed at protecting Coloradans from the ill effects of both too-rapid and too-slow climate change regulation should take the broadest approach possible to the issue. Such an amendment would guarantee Coloradans access to all forms of energy production — without exclusion or preference.
Could there be a time when Republicans retake power for the first time in decades and immediately try to ban rooftop solar or geothermal projects? Such a ban would set back our creep toward renewable energy but could be justified by increasing utility prices for the remaining customers who cannot provide their own energy source.
The world of energy production is too rapidly evolving for a single product to get protections over and above any other energy source.
Take, for example, the rapidly improving technology of nuclear micro-reactors. There could come a time when the safety of these products becomes so absolute that they are clearly the emission-free solution to climate change. Guaranteeing utilities the right to sell nuclear energy despite concerns about the radiation waste they create could be the only way politically to get reactors approved in Colorado.
Or Coloradans could do the prudent and cautious thing and keep energy-product guarantees out of the Constitution altogether. We can start by voting against Amendment 82.
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