Palo Alto committee recommends $6.6 million fund for affordable multifamily electrification

The City of Palo Alto Climate and Sustainability Committee on March 21 unanimously recommended that the City Council approve a staff proposal to create an affordable multifamily housing electrification grant program and a $6,600,000 budget amendment from gas utility cap-and-trade reserves.

The recommendation, presented by Jonathan Aubanshine, Assistant Director for Climate Action, would establish grants to help property owners replace aging gas equipment — including space heating and water heating — with electric heat-pump systems and related electrical upgrades. Aubanshine said the program is designed to be used as local matching funds to leverage state incentives and to act quickly where gas equipment is nearing end of life.

The pilot stems from a city study of multifamily buildings that surveyed five sites and found widespread gas equipment approaching the end of its useful life. Aubanshine said that equipment affects roughly 400 units, about 25% of the city’s affordable housing stock identified in the study, and that the program is sized to electrify the equipment…