Southern California air regulators will vote Friday on two proposed regulations to curb smog and lessen pollution that’s heating up the planet.
For nearly two years, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, which regulates air quality across much of L.A., Orange, San Bernardino and Riverside counties, has been working to update rules to phase out gas furnaces and water heaters, as well as incentivize replacing them with less polluting electric appliances, such as heat pumps.
These appliances may be small, but add them up across millions of homes and businesses and they’re actually one of the largest contributors to Southern California’s notorious smog, according to air district officials. A recent data analysis by climate think tank Rocky Mountain Institute found that gas-burning equipment in homes and businesses in Greater L.A. produce seven times more smog-forming pollution than the region’s power plants.
And buildings, mostly because they’re hooked up to methane gas pipes and appliances, account for about a quarter of the state’s planet-heating greenhouse gas emissions, according to state air regulators…