Honorable Mayor and City Council Members, I am writing to encourage Menlo Park's participation in the Peninsula and Silicon Valley regional initiative to advance building “reach codes.” Adopting reach codes is the single biggest climate action that the city can take this year. Reach codes enable all-electric, carbon-free buildings that make our buildings safer, healthier, and more affordable, as well as help meet local climate action plan goals. It will also future-proof our city against costly and uncertain supplies of natural gas, and make us a leader, a role model, for cities throughout the U.S. More than 15 cities so far are working with Peninsula Clean Energy, Silicon Valley Clean Energy, and technical consultants to develop Reach Codes in time to synch up with new statewide “Title 24” standards that will go into effect January 1, 2020. Please make it a priority for Menlo Park to review the Reach Codes and have a public hearing on them this summer, and at the latest by September. This will ensure that our city is ready with the cleanest energy policies in place in time for the statewide building energy standard update in January. The Reach Code will benefit our city by: • Saving money – All-electric homes save at least $6,000 in construction costs. • Improving health and safety by avoiding indoor pollution and highly flammable combustion sources inside our homes & buildings. • Making a highly visible and practical step forward to address the climate crisis, by breaking the cycle of fossil fuel dependency in buildings. Each new electric home saves 4 tons of carbon per year. All electric reach codes will be a strong market signal to spur development of more carbon-free, electric solutions for existing homes. I hope you will support the Reach Codes as an important climate action to phase out fossil natural gas fuel use in our homes and buildings. Let’s work together towards a fossil free and climate-stable future.! Sincerely, Darshana Maya Greenfield Received on Wed Jul 03 2019 - 14:23:43 PDT
