Kyiv Post hears the experiences of the guardians of vital infrastructure, unable to shelter despite relentless missile attacks.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday asked President Joe Biden’s administration to weigh in on whether the justices should decide whether a publicly funded charter school in North Carolina may have violated the rights of female students – deemed “fragile vessels” by the school’s founder – by requiring girls to wear skirts.

The justices are considering whether to hear an appeal by Charter Day School, located in the southeastern North Carolina town of Leland and operated by a private educational management company, of a lower court’s ruling that found that the dress code ran afoul of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment civil rights protections.

The justices asked U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar to file a brief expressing the Biden administration’s view on the litigation and whether the Supreme Court should take up the matter.

Aaron Streett, a lawyer for the school, called the Supreme Court’s decision to seek the solicitor general’s input rather than reject its appeal a “positive sign” that “indicates that the court views this as an important case that may merit further review.”

Charter Day School, which enrolls students from kindergarten through the eighth grade, emphasizes what it calls “traditional values” and has implemented a dress code that its founder, businessman Baker Mitchell, has said would “preserve chivalry” and ensure that girls are treated “courteously and more gently than boys.” Mitchell, as explained in the lower court’s ruling, viewed chivalry as “a code of conduct” under which women are “regarded as a fragile vessel that men are supposed to take care of and honor.”

Charter schools are publicly funded but operated separately from school boards run by local governments.

Lawyers for the school said the ruling last year by the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals posed an “existential threat” to a conservative-backed movement to increase alternatives for parents who want their children to receive public education by expanding the numbers of charter schools.

After being hit with a civil rights lawsuit by three female students backed by the American Civil Liberties Union, Charter Day School argued that the 14th Amendment does not apply to it because it is a private entity, not a “state actor” like public schools operated directly by North Carolina school districts.

The 4th Circuit on a 10-6 vote decided that the school was a “state actor” because North Carolina delegated to it its duty to provide free, universal education to students. The 4th Circuit found that the school violated the rights of the plaintiffs to equal protection with a dress code based on gender stereotypes about the “proper place” for girls in society.

Charter schools usually are independently run as a stand-alone entity but can also be managed by for-profit companies or nonprofit organizations running multiple schools, as in this case, with Charter Day School among a group of schools operated by the private Roger Bacon Academy.

The plaintiffs argued that the dress code violated their 14th Amendment rights and subjected them to discrimination and denial of the full benefits of their education in violation of the civil rights law Title IX, which bars sex discrimination in education. The 4th Circuit ruling did not make a conclusion on the Title IX claim.

“Courts may not subjugate the constitutional rights of these public-school children to the facade of school choice,” wrote U.S. Circuit Judge Barbara Milano Keenan, in a decision joined by her fellow Democratic appointees on the 4th Circuit.

The six dissenting votes on the 4th Circuit came from Republican-appointed judges including Judge A. Marvin Quattlebaum Jr, who wrote that the decision would stifle “innovative alternatives to traditional public education.”

Judge J. Harvey Wilkinson called the ruling a “shame” and said the school’s “chivalric approach should neither be legally banished from the educational system, nor should it be legally imposed.”

The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority.

Ten Republican state attorneys general, led by Ken Paxton of Texas, backed the school in briefs to the Supreme Court, saying the 4th Circuit’s ruling threatens charters school independence.

People look at the site of a missile strike that occurred during the night, as Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, January 8, 2023.

REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne

• Russia said it killed hundreds of Ukrainian troops in revenge for a deadly strike on its forces.
• The Kremlin claimed over 600 Ukrainian troops died in a strike on Sunday in Kramatorsk.
• However, journalists and officials reported that there’s no evidence that a single soldier died.

Russia claimed it killed hundreds of Ukrainian troops over the weekend in response to a deadly attack carried out by Kyiv over the New Year holiday, but there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that happened.

Moscow said it killed over 600 Ukrainians in a Sunday missile strike on temporary bases in the eastern city of Kramatorsk, state-run news outlet TASS reported. 

“Over the past day, Russian intelligence means detected and reliably confirmed through various independent channels some temporary bases of Ukrainian servicemen in Kramatorsk,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesperson Lt. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said, according to the report. “As a result of a massive missile strike on these temporary bases of Ukrainian units, more than 600 Ukrainian servicemen were killed.”

However, there appears to be no evidence to support the Russian claim. Journalists from multiple news outlets visited the area and reported that there were no indications of mass causalities. A Reuters team even said there were no obvious signs that soldiers had been living in the building.

—Eliot Higgins (@EliotHiggins) January 8, 2023

Ukrainian officials have also pushed back on Moscow’s claim. The mayor of Kramatorsk said no soldiers had been killed or injured, and Serhii Cherevatyi, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s military, told CNN that Russia’s story is “nonsense.”

Municipal workers clear the rubble on the roof of College No. 47 which was damaged by a Russian rocket attack in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, Monday, Jan. 9, 2023.

AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka

Even Russian mil-bloggers have questioned the Kremlin’s claims and criticized Moscow’s military leadership for making things up in an attempt to try and make it seem like Russia successfully retaliated for a recent Ukrainian strike that killed scores of Russian troops, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said in an analysis.

Critics, ISW explained, said Russia’s defense ministry regularly makes false claims and expressed dissatisfaction with the leadership for fabricating a story of revenge rather than addressing the failures responsible for Russian losses.

According to TASS, the Kramatorsk strike was carried out in response to a devastating Ukrainian attack on Russian forces that took place over the New Year holiday. Kyiv used a US-provided High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) to strike Russian positions in the occupied city of Makiivka. The Kremlin said the attack killed nearly 90 of Moscow’s troops in a rare disclosure of battlefield losses.

Ukraine’s military offered a much higher death toll, claiming as many as 400 troops were killed with another 300 injured. Neither of the estimates could be independently verified. 

The attack immediately stirred sweeping criticism of Russia’s military leadership and ignited calls within Russia to punish top officials. Moscow later pinned blame for the attack on the use of cellphones by its own soldiers — which Russia said allowed Ukraine to determine their location and carry out the strike. That story was dismissed by many in both Russia and Ukraine.

The losses suffered by the Russians in Makiivka have been attributed to the stationing of Russian troops close together near ammunition storage within firing range, actions considered to be substantial missteps on the part of Russian commanders.

Russian President Vladimir Putin

REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino

• Russia’s Urals blend is now trading well below the $60 price cap at just $37.80 a barrel, according to data from Argus Media.
• That’s less than half the international benchmark Brent crude, squeezing Russia’s oil revenue.
• The nation is struggling to replace European oil customers, and has just a few large oil buyers remaining.

Russia’s main oil product is now trading way below the G7’s $60 price cap, as the heavily sanctioned nation only has a handful of buyers to keep up its crude oil trade.

Urals grade, Russia’s largest crude oil export, traded at its Baltic Sea port at just $37.80 a barrel on Friday, according to data from Argus Media.

In addition to lagging below the price cap, that’s less than half the price of international benchmark Brent crude, which was trading at about $80 a barrel on Monday.

Western nations slapped the price cap on top of the European Union’s ban of Russian oil in December, part of the latest round of sanctions intended to crimp Moscow’s war revenue.

Europe was one of Russia’s largest crude oil customers, and Russian oil suppliers are now unable to use Western shipping and insurance services unless they agree to abide by the price cap mechanism.

It’s been difficult for Russia to navigate those headwinds: the nation’s oil export revenue fell $15 million in the last week of 2022, and there are just a few main buyers of Russian crude left, namely China, India, and Turkey, Bloomberg reported.

Those customers have also been able to score steeper discounts on oil as Russia struggles to replace European oil sales. Russia had sold oil below the price cap to India, and at least one oil shipment was sold to China at $68 a barrel, just above the price cap level.

President Vladimir Putin has called the price cap “stupid” and emphasized the resilience of Russia’s economy, though its central bank has warned that the latest round of sanctions were new economic shocks to the nation. The damage done by sanctions could even cause Russia to become a failed state or break up by 2033, according to a recent survey of experts.

Russia has refused to formally abide by the price cap mechanism and threatened to retaliate against any country that enforces it, such as by slashing its oil output by 700,000 barrels a day. That, along with the 1 million barrel-a-day drop expected from the EU ban, could cause oil prices to spike past $100 a barrel, UBS warned.

The US needs to grow its EV charging infrastructure 8 times by 2030, a new report says.

Source Photo/Getty Images

• The US is in desperate need of more charging for electric cars.
• Charging needs to quadruple by 2025 and grow eight-fold by 2030 to accommodate EVs.
• That’s going to require a lot of investment, public-private partnerships, and government support.

The US doesn’t have nearly enough plugs to accommodate the coming influx of electric cars. 

Charging infrastructure has been growing quickly over the past several years, but not fast enough now that the country has reached what some called a crucial tipping point in EV adoption, with 5% of new car sales electric last year.

Specifically, the US needs to quadruple its charging infrastructure by 2025, and grow it more than eight times by 2030, according to a new report out of S&P Global Mobility.

According to the firm, there are currently about 126,500 Level 2 charging stations (which take about five hours to fully recharge an EV) and 20,431 Level 3 (about 15-20 minutes to charge an EV to 80% battery) charging stations in the US — several thousand of which were just installed last year. 

There are also about 16,822 Tesla Superchargers and Tesla destination chargers.

But S&P Global Mobility says that, assuming there could be as many as 7.8 million EVs on the roads in 2025, that will require 700,000 Level 2 and 70,000 Level 3 chargers deployed.

Looking to 2030, with as many as 28.3 million EVs expected on US roads, 2.13 million Level 2 and 172,000 Level 3 public chargers will be required, S&P Global Mobility forecasts, in addition to the home charging setups drivers might install. 

Automakers are betting their futures on available charging

A lack of charging infrastructure is a problem, as nearly every major automaker is buying into electrification with billions in new technology, models, and manufacturing. 

After all, 46% of US consumers surveyed last year for Deloitte’s 2023 global automotive consumer study cited lack of public charging infrastructure as a major barrier to EV penetration. That’s despite the fact that a majority of EV charging can be done at home — if an EV owner has access to a garage and plug.

The charging industry has been getting tons of interest as a result, and could be a more than $207.5 billion market by 2030, according to Guidehouse Insights. But it’s facing a ton of challenges. 

So far, charging hasn’t been much of a money-making venture for those in the space. It often requires time-consuming, costly, and complex electrical and construction work. 

It’s unclear where the onus lies to maintain the infrastructure once it is installed. It’s crucial to proactively pick the best spots where charging will be utilized the most — but it’s also important to prioritize lower-income communities that have been left out of the EV push.

That could change with more and more momentum from the Biden Administration, which is targeting a national network of 500,000 public charging stations by 2030 and has slated $7.5 billion toward charging build-out.

Hillary Flur and her business partner, Malek Alqadi.

Courtesy of Hillary Flur

• Hillary Flur, 31, is the owner of an off-the-grid Airbnb in Joshua Tree, California.
• Flur started as an Airbnb host 10 years ago, when she listed her apartment to afford rent.
• Now, Flur has an investor, new properties on the way, and quit her job to do Airbnb full-time.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Hillary Flur, 31, an Airbnb owner in Joshua Tree, California. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I didn’t see myself becoming an Airbnb owner. But after figuring out how to make extra money using the platform, my business partner and I decided to buy a space of our own to rent out.

I got my start on Airbnb by listing my apartment to afford rent 

When I first moved to California in 2013, I was working at The Honest Company as a customer service agent and couldn’t afford to live in LA. Then I heard about Airbnb, and I thought to myself: “I’m going to Airbnb my apartment so I can afford rent.”

My friend Malek Alqadi lived above me and decided to do the same with his apartment. Whenever we had Airbnb guests, I would go stay with him or he would come stay with me, and we’d just switch back and forth and split the earnings.

My friend and I wondered how much better would it be if we actually owned a property

We’d seen the convenience of Airbnb, how much potential it had, and how much money we could make. So instead of renting out an apartment to make ends meet, we decided to do a project together. 

Once we made our decision, we spent about a year looking for the right type of property. At first, we thought it had to be near LA, because we didn’t know how we could be hosts if we weren’t close by. But we couldn’t afford anything.

One of my colleagues at the time told me they were buying an affordable property in Joshua Tree

That’s when we started looking out there. It took some time to find the perfect piece of property, but we finally landed on two and a half acres out there.

It was a rundown homestead — a remnant from a homestead act, where they were basically giving land away for free as long as you built four walls and a roof. Because of that, there are all these abandoned shacks in the area.

We purchased a property together for $15,000 in 2016

From there, we wanted to create a really unique experience. Malek is an architect and designed the space, including the second structure. With my background in customer experience, I took on creating the customer journey. 

Courtesy of Hillary Flur

My goal was to create a really great experience for customers, from when they booked the Airbnb to stepping onto the property for the first time. I made sure to keep in mind things like: what type of amenities we offer, what kind of activities there are to do, and even what kind of scent we want for the cabin. I really wanted to make it a super cool, unique, and personalized experience.

We designed our Airbnb to be completely off the grid

I’ve always been passionate about sustainability, so that was important. We also thought about what people wanted to experience when they visited. We found that most people come to Joshua Tree to go camping and have an outdoor experience. That’s why we built a stargazing deck on our second building.

To make it happen, we took out a Home Depot loan for $40,000 and a personal loan. We had the help of a contractor, but we were doing a lot of the grunt work. During the summer, we were digging out trenches in 110 degree weather while working full time jobs. 

Malek and I would work from Monday to Friday in our office, and then on the weekends we would drive out to Joshua Tree and start building. The building process took us about a year. I thought it would be a fun passion project, but it was way harder than we expected.

It probably took us a year to feel comfortable running the business

The first year was kind of a test year, and our success snowballed when we were featured in various publications. We also used that first year to survey customers about their stay and how we could make the property better.

Since we started renting the property in late 2016, unique Airbnbs in Joshua Tree have grown in popularity. There’s definitely a debate between locals who love Airbnb and hate it, but I think overall, it’s helped increase job opportunities and the development of new businesses in the area.

It’s also increased property values. For people who’re trying to do Airbnb in Joshua Tree now, it can be pretty hard to find something affordable. Currently, our rates are between $725 and $1,250 per night to be profitable. 

With the success of our first cabin, I was able to quit my job recently

We brought on an investor to help with a new property we’re working on. We recently purchased 100 acres, and we’re moving more east to Wonder Valley, where we’ll build eight new cabins.

Despite our success, it’s not easy running an Airbnb. It takes a lot of initial work to get a business off the ground, get it up and running, and create the brand behind it. There’s more competition now too, so you have to go above and beyond the customer’s expectations to make something successful.

Even with great customers, you’re still dealing with many different types of people. I think without customer service experience, it would be difficult to navigate what are real issues and what aren’t.

I’ve learned most people just want to be heard — and you have to be able to respond in a way that’s thoughtful and not just automatic.

In a critical boost to President Joe Biden’s reelection prospects, the Food and Drug Administration has approved a new Alzheimer’s drug that “may modestly slow the pace of cognitive decline,” according to the New York Times.

Biden, the first octogenarian president in American history, is expected to formally announce his plans to seek a second term sometime next month, thus setting the stage for a potential rematch against Donald Trump.

The president is going to need all the help he can get to mitigate the rapid deterioration of his brain before Election Day in 2024, which is probably why his administration fast-tracked the new Alzheimer’s drug, Leqembi, using its “accelerated approval” designation. The new drug also carries some risk, as a significant percentage of patients in clinical trials experienced swelling and bleeding in the brain after taking Leqembi.

Whereas Trump has no discernible flaws, Biden has been widely criticized as “too old to be president.” He would be 86 by the time he left office after two terms and has already exceeded the average life expectancy for American males by several years. His cognitive decline is glaringly obvious to anyone who has watched him attempt to speak in public. A recent CNBC poll found that 70 percent of Americans, including a majority of Democrats, don’t want Biden to run for reelection.

Biden has repeatedly refused to subject himself to independent testing that could shed light on his cognitive health, or lack thereof. When CBS reporter Errol Barnett asked Biden in 2020 if he would take a cognitive test to allay voter concerns about his health, the then-candidate responded by accusing the black journalist of being a “cocaine” “junkie.”

Trump, by contrast, is renowned for his superhuman stamina and has aced every cognitive test he’s ever taken. An esteemed doctor famously described him as “the healthiest individual ever elected president.”

WATCH: Two Minutes of Joe Biden Wandering Around Looking Lost

The post FDA Fast-Tracks New Alzheimer’s Drug in Boost to Biden’s Reelection Bid appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

By Saeed Azhar and Scott Murdoch

(Reuters)—Goldman Sachs Group will start cutting thousands of jobs across the firm from Wednesday, two sources familiar with the move said, as it prepares for a tough economic environment.

Just over 3,000 employees will be let go, one of the sources said, but the final number is yet to be determined. That scale of layoffs would be the largest since the 2008 financial crisis, one of the sources said.

The sources could not be named as the information was not yet disclosed publicly. Goldman Sachs declined to comment.

Bloomberg News reported on Sunday that Goldman would eliminate about 3,200 positions.

Goldman had 49,100 employees at the end of the third quarter, after adding significant numbers of staff during the coronavirus pandemic.

The layoffs are likely to affect most of the bank’s major divisions, but should centre on Goldman Sachs’ investment banking arm, one of the sources said. Wall Street banks have suffered a major slowdown in corporate dealmaking activity as a result of volatile global financial markets.

Hundreds of jobs are also likely to be reduced from Goldman Sachs’ consumer business, Marcus, after it scaled back plans for the loss-making unit, the sources said.

The bank’s chief executive David Solomon sent a year-end voice memo to staff warning of a headcount reduction in the first half of January, two separate sources said. Goldman Sachs declined comment on the memo.

The job cuts come ahead of the bank’s annual bonus payments which are usually delivered later in January and are expected to fall about 40%.

The bank restarted its annual performance review process and staff cuts in September after pausing for two years during the pandemic.

The Wall Street giant typically trims about 1% to 5% of employees each year. These new cuts will come on top of the earlier layoffs.

Global banks, including Morgan Stanley and Citigroup Inc, have reduced their workforces in recent months as a dealmaking boom on Wall Street fizzled out due to high interest rates, tensions between the United States and China, the war between Russia and Ukraine, and soaring inflation.

Global investment banking fees nearly halved in 2022, with $77 billion earned by the banks, down from $132.3 billion one year earlier, Dealogic data showed.

The total value of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) globally had slumped 37% to $3.66 trillion by Dec. 20, according to Dealogic data, after hitting an all-time high of $5.9 trillion last year.

Banks had executed $517 billion worth of equity capital markets (ECM) transactions by late December 2022, the lowest level since the early 2000s and a 66% drop from 2021’s bonanza, according to Dealogic data.

Despite the slowdown, Goldman’s top dealmakers told Reuters in recent interviews that they are bullish on an M&A recovery in the second half of 2023.

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar in New York and Scott Murdoch in Sydney; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell, Christopher Cushing, and Nick Zieminski)

The post Goldman Sachs Prepares Biggest Layoffs Since 2008 Financial Crisis appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

(DENVER) — Earth’s protective ozone layer is slowly but noticeably healing at a pace that would fully mend the hole over Antarctica in about 43 years, a new United Nations report says.

A once-every-four-years scientific assessment found recovery in progress, more than 35 years after every nation in the world agreed to stop producing chemicals that chomp on the layer of ozone in Earth’s atmosphere that shields the planet from harmful radiation linked to skin cancer, cataracts and crop damage.

“In the upper stratosphere and in the ozone hole we see things getting better,” said Paul Newman, co-chair of the scientific assessment.

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The progress is slow, according to the report presented Monday at the American Meteorological Society convention in Denver. The global average amount of ozone 18 miles (30 kilometers) high in the atmosphere won’t be back to 1980 pre-thinning levels until about 2040, the report said. And it won’t be back to normal in the Arctic until 2045.

Antarctica, where it’s so thin there’s an annual giant gaping hole in the layer, won’t be fully fixed until 2066, the report said.

Scientists and environmental advocates across the world have long hailed the efforts to heal the ozone hole — springing out of a 1987 agreement called the Montreal Protocol that banned a class of chemicals often used in refrigerants and aerosols — as one of the biggest ecological victories for humanity.

“Ozone action sets a precedent for climate action. Our success in phasing out ozone-eating chemicals shows us what can and must be done – as a matter of urgency — to transition away from fossil fuels, reduce greenhouse gases and so limit temperature increase,” World Meteorological Organization Secretary-General Prof. Petteri Taalas said in a statement.

Signs of healing were reported four years ago but were slight and more preliminary. “Those numbers of recovery have solidified a lot,” Newman said.

The two chief chemicals that munch away at ozone are in lower levels in the atmosphere, said Newman, chief Earth scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. Chlorine levels are down 11.5% since they peaked in 1993 and bromine, which is more efficient at eating ozone but is at lower levels in the air, dropped 14.5% since its 1999 peak, the report said.

That bromine and chlorine levels “stopped growing and is coming down is a real testament to the effectiveness of the Montreal Protocol,” Newman said.

Natural weather patterns in the Antarctic also affect ozone hole levels, which peak in the fall. And the past couple years, the holes have been a bit bigger because of that but the overall trend is one of healing, Newman said.

This is “saving 2 million people every year from skin cancer,” United Nations Environment Programme Director Inger Andersen told The Associated Press earlier this year in an email.

A few years ago emissions of one of the banned chemicals, chlorofluorocarbon-11 (CFC-11), stopped shrinking and was rising. Rogue emissions were spotted in part of China but now have gone back down to where they are expected, Newman said.

A third generation of those chemicals, called HFC, was banned a few years ago not because it would eat at the ozone layer but because it is a heat-trapping greenhouse gas. The new report says that the ban would avoid 0.5 to 0.9 degrees (0.3 to 0.5 degrees Celsius) of additional warming.

The report also warned that efforts to artificially cool the planet by putting aerosols into the atmosphere to reflect the sunlight would thin the ozone layer by as much as 20% in Antarctica.

A federal agency says a ban on gas stoves is on the table amid rising concern about harmful indoor air pollutants emitted by the appliances.

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission plans to take action to address the pollution, which can cause health and respiratory problems.

“This is a hidden hazard,” Richard Trumka Jr., an agency commissioner, said in an interview. “Any option is on the table. Products that can’t be made safe can be banned.”

Natural gas stoves, which are used in about 40% of homes in the US, emit air pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and fine particulate matter at levels the EPA and World Health Organization have said are unsafe and linked to respiratory illness, cardiovascular problems, cancer, and other health conditions, according to reports by groups such as the Institute for Policy Integrity and the American Chemical Society. Consumer Reports, in October, urged consumers planning to buy a new range to consider going electric after tests conducted by the group found high levels of nitrogen oxide gases from gas stoves.

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Read more: The Best Stove for Your Health and the Environment

New peer-reviewed research published last month in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that more than 12% of current childhood asthma cases in the US can be attributed to gas stove use.

“There is about 50 years of health studies showing that gas stoves are bad for our health, and the strongest evidence is on children and children’s asthma,” said Brady Seals, a manager in the carbon-free buildings program at the nonprofit clean energy group RMI and a co-author of the study. “By having a gas connection, we are polluting the insides of our homes.”

The Bethesda, Maryland-based Consumer Product Safety Commission, which has a staff of roughly 500, plans to open public comment on hazards posed by gas stoves later this winter. Besides barring the manufacture or import of gas stoves, options include setting standards on emissions from the appliances, Trumka said.

Lawmakers have weighed in, asking the commission to consider requiring warning labels, range hoods and performance standards. In a letter to the agency in December, lawmakers including Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey and Representative Don Beyer of Virginia, both Democrats, urged action and called gas-stove emissions a “cumulative burden” on Black, Latino and low-income households that disproportionately experience air pollution.

Parallel efforts by state and local policymakers are targeting the use of natural gas in buildings more broadly, in a push to reduce climate-warming emissions (such as from methane) that exacerbate climate change. Nearly 100 cities and counties have adopted policies that require or encourage a move away from fossil fuel powered buildings. The New York City Council voted in 2021 to ban natural gas hookups in new buildings smaller than seven stories by the end of this year. The California Air Resources Board unanimously voted in September to ban the sale of natural gas-fired furnaces and water heaters by 2030.

Read more: Your Gas Stove May Be Leaking Benzene Into Your Kitchen—Even When It’s Off

Consumers who want to switch from gas to electric ranges could get some help from the massive climate spending bill signed into law in August. The Inflation Reduction Act includes rebates of up to $840 for the purchase of new electric ranges as part of some $4.5 billion in funding to help low- and moderate-income households electrify their homes.

The Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, which represents gas range manufacturers such as Whirlpool Corp., says that cooking produces emissions and harmful byproducts no matter what kind of stove is used.

“Ventilation is really where this discussion should be, rather than banning one particular type of technology,” said Jill Notini, a vice president with the Washington-based trade group. “Banning one type of a cooking appliance is not going to address the concerns about overall indoor air quality. We may need some behavior change, we may need [people] to turn on their hoods when cooking.”

Natural gas distributors, whose business is threatened by the growing push to electrify homes, argue that a ban on natural gas stoves would drive up costs for homeowners and restaurants with little environmental gain. The American Gas Association, which represents utilities such as Dominion Energy Inc. and DTE Energy Co., said in a statement that regulatory and advisory agencies responsible for protecting residential consumer health and safety have presented no documented risks from gas stoves.

“The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and EPA do not present gas ranges as a significant contributor to adverse air quality or health hazard in their technical or public information literature, guidance, or requirements,” said Karen Harbert, the group’s president. “The most practical, realistic way to achieve a sustainable future where energy is clean, as well as safe, reliable and affordable, is to ensure it includes natural gas and the infrastructure that transports it.”

Trumka, who before joining the commission worked for a House committee in a role that included work on toxic heavy metals in baby food and the health hazards of e-cigarettes, said the commission could issue its proposal as soon as this year, though he conceded that would be “on the quick side.”

“There is this misconception that if you want to do fine-dining kind of cooking it has to be done on gas,” Trumka said. “It’s a carefully manicured myth.”