Dozens of public housing apartments will get plug-in induction ranges as part of the initiative, which aims to eventually shift 10,000 NYCHA homes off the use of polluting fossil fuel appliances.

Agnes Winn, 91, a resident at NYCHA’s Red Hook West Houses, during a months-long cooking gas outage in 2024. Officials say converting to electric stoves will eliminate the service disruptions many tenants are used to. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

For many NYCHA tenants, gas service outages are far too common. On Monday, the housing authority reported 79 such disruptions across its more than 300 developments—breakdowns that can last for months at a time, forcing tenants to cook on hot plates or turn repeatedly to takeout.

But officials are pursuing a solution they say will help avoid that hardship: swapping out gas stoves for energy-efficient induction ranges at 100 NYCHA apartments, with a goal of expanding the upgrades to 10,000 public housing units in the coming years.

The $32 million plan was first announced in 2023 by NYCHA, the New York Power Authority and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, which asked appliance manufacturers to submit proposals for non-gas powered stoves that could be installed at scale across the housing authority’s aging buildings.

The winning submission came from Copper, a California-based company which designed a battery-equipped induction stove that plugs into a standard 120-volt outlet. That means the units can be used in existing NYCHA kitchens without the need for major electrical upgrades.

“We can help these buildings avoid a lot of infrastructure cost,” said Copper CEO Sam Calisch.

That applies to both the initial installation and ongoing maintenance. “These buildings, they’re paying a lot to maintain these old gas systems. And very frequently these gas systems have problems. They have to be tested, they leak,” he said.

Repairing gas pipes can require tearing down walls—work that can get complicated in older properties, where asbestos or lead paint might lurk—as well as result in outages for tenants.

“We can come in and be an extremely affordable option relative to that, and also allow the building to retire that gas infrastructure at the same time,” Calisch said. Since the stoves are partly powered by battery, they can also work even in the case of a power outage, he added.

One of Copper’s existing induction stove models. The
company will design 100 ranges for NYCHA as part of
the pilot program. (Photo courtesy of Copper)

There are other benefits to moving off of gas. Buildings account for roughly 70 percent of New York City’s greenhouse emissions, and NYCHA has 2,411 of them across 335 developments. Gas stoves are also a leading source of indoor pollution, releasing chemicals like methane and nitrogen dioxide into homes that can exacerbate respiratory ailments like asthma.

In another earlier pilot program, NYCHA and environmental advocates swapped out gas stoves for electric ones in 20 public housing apartments in The Bronx and saw improved air quality as a result, news site The City reported in 2023.

NYCHA has not yet specified which of its developments will see the first 100 induction stoves installed during the pilot phase. “Pilot units will be chosen based on anticipated need for gas riser work that could be averted through use of the stoves, resident leadership support, and operational feasibility,” a spokesman for the housing authority said in an email.

The initiative is modeled off another pilot program that seeks to replace fossil fuel-burning boilers at NYCHA properties with 30,000 eco-friendly electric heat pumps that can both heat and cool apartments. An initial 72 were installed at the Woodside Houses starting in 2023.

The changes at NYCHA are playing out amid broader debate over how to decarbonize New York’s housing stock in the face of climate change. The city has already banned the use of gas infrastructure in newly constructed buildings, starting with smaller properties in 2024 and expanding to all other new builds in 2027.

A similar statewide ban, dubbed the All-Electric Buildings Act, passed the legislature in Albany in 2023, but has faced major pushback from the fossil fuel industry. It was set to take effect in January, but is now on hold, after Gov. Kathy Hochul agreed to delay its implementation for at least a year.

To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

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The post NYCHA to Replace Gas Stoves in 100 Apartments Under Energy-Efficiency Pilot Program appeared first on City Limits.

Three members of the Minnesota Wild are all but locks to be in Italy in February chasing an Olympic gold medal as part of Team Sweden. Nearly every roster projection includes Joel Eriksson Ek at forward, Jonas Brodin on defense and Filip Gustavsson in goal.

But another Wild player might have have Team Sweden coach Sam Hallam thinking about a roster addition.

On Monday night in Vegas, Wild forward Marcus Johansson scored his 12th goal of the season just 26 seconds into the game, and followed it up with the trio of assists in Minnesota’s walk-away 5-2 win. The dozen goals are more than Johansson, 35, notched in either of his two previous full seasons, and the 2025-26 campaign will not be half done until the conclusion of Wednesday’s game in San Jose.

“I think he’s really playing with a lot of confidence. I think his skating has been great,” Wild coach John Hynes said after Johansson posted a four-point game for the second time in his career. “His two-way game has been really solid, and I think he’s certainly deserving of the production that he’s getting.”

For players not headed to Milan for the 2026 Winter Olympics, the three-week break from the NHL schedule will be a time to relax and recover. But as he plays some of his best hockey, Johansson made it clear he would welcome the opportunity to play for his country instead of visiting a beach somewhere.

As of Monday night, he had not been contacted by anyone from Team Sweden.

“I would love to. Hopefully I’ve shown enough. We’ll see,” he said to reporters in the postgame scrum in Vegas. “It’s an honor to play for your country. Like I said, I’ve done … what I can to earn a spot. We’ll see.”

Putting on the blue and gold has been an important part of Johansson’s career, starting in 2007 and 2008 when he skated for Sweden in the World Juniors. He also donned the three crowns in the 2014 Winter Olympics, and most recently last spring when he posted eight points in nine games for the Swedes in the 2025 IIHF World Championship.

Hynes, who has coached Team USA at the international level many times, said in Johansson this season he has seen an on-ice resume that deserves a second look from his countrymen.

“Obviously I’m not the decision-maker, but I think the way that he’s played to date, and (because) he’s played on other Sweden national teams,” Hynes said. “He’s gone to the World Championships numerous times. He’s played in the Olympics, and he’s playing some of his best hockey. Good for him. I’m hoping he certainly makes it.”

Team Sweden opens Olympic play Feb. 11 versus host Italy.

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By KEN SWEET, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — The White House cannot lapse in its funding of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a federal district court judge ruled on Tuesday, only days before funds at the bureau would have likely run out and the consumer finance agency would have no money to pay its employees.

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Judge Amy Berman ruled that the CFPB can continue to get its funds from the Federal Reserve, despite the Fed operating at a loss, and that the White House’s new legal argument about how the CFPB gets its funds is not valid.

At the heart of this case is whether Russell Vought, President Donald Trump’s budget director and the acting director of the CFPB, can effectively shut down the agency and lay off all of the bureau’s employees. The CFPB has largely been inoperable since President Trump has sworn into office nearly a year ago. Its employees are mostly forbidden from doing any work, and most of the bureau’s operations this year has been to unwind the work it did under President Biden and even under Trump’s first term.

Vought himself has made comments where he has made it clear that his intention is to effectively shut down the CFPB.

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents the workers at the CFPB, has been mostly successful in court to stop the mass layoffs. The union sued Vought earlier this year and won a preliminary injunction stopping the layoffs.

In recent weeks, the White House has used a new line of argument to potentially get around the court’s restraining order. The argument is that the Federal Reserve has no “combined earnings” at the moment to fund the CFPB’s operations. The CFPB gets its funding from the Fed through expected quarterly payments.

The Federal Reserve has been operating at a paper loss since 2022 as a result of the central bank trying to combat inflation. The Fed holds bonds on its balance sheet from a period of low interest rates during the COVID-19 pandemic, but currently has to pay out higher interest rates to banks who hold their deposits at the central bank. The Fed has been recording a “deferred asset” on its balance sheet which it expects will be paid down in the next few years as the low interest bonds mature off the Fed’s balance sheet.

Because of this loss on paper, the White House has argued there are no “combined earnings” for the CFPB to draw on. The CFPB has operated since 2011, including under President Trump’s first term, drawing on the Fed’s operating budget.

White House lawyers sent a notice to the court in early November, where they argued that the CFPB would run out of appropriations in early 2026, using the “combined earnings” argument, and does not expect to get any additional appropriations from Congress.

This combined earnings legal argument is not entirely new. It has floated in conservative legal circles going back to the moment the Federal Reserve started operating at a loss. However, it has never been tested in court.

“It appears that defendants’ new understanding of “combined earnings” is an unsupported and transparent attempt to starve the CPFB of funding and yet another attempt to achieve the very end the Court’s injunction was put in place to prevent,” Berman wrote in an opinion.

A White House spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Berman’s opinion.

By MICHAEL PHILLIS, ALEXA ST. JOHN and MATTHEW DALY

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has transformed the Environmental Protection Agency in its first year, cutting federal limits on air and water pollution and promoting fossil fuels, a metamorphosis that clashes with the agency’s historic mission to protect human health and the environment.

The administration says its actions will “unleash” the American economy, but environmentalists say the agency’s abrupt change in focus threatens to unravel years of progress on climate-friendly initiatives that could be hard or impossible to reverse.

“It just constantly wants to pat the fossil fuel business on the back and turn back the clock to a pre-Richard Nixon era” when the agency didn’t exist, said historian Douglas Brinkley.

A lot has happened this year at “Trump’s EPA,” as Zeldin frequently calls the agency. Zeldin proposed overturning the landmark finding that climate change is a threat to human health. He pledged to roll back dozens of environmental regulations in “the greatest day of deregulation our nation has seen.” He froze billions of dollars for clean energy and upended agency research.

Zeldin has argued the EPA can protect the environment and grow the economy at the same time. He announced “five pillars” to guide EPA’s work; four were economic goals, including energy dominance — Trump’s shorthand for more fossil fuels — and boosting the auto industry.

Zeldin, a former New York congressman who had a record as a moderate Republican on some environmental issues, said his views on climate change have evolved. Many federal and state climate goals are unattainable in the near future — and come at huge cost, he said.

“We should not be causing … extreme economic pain for an individual or a family” because of policies aimed at “saving the planet,” he told reporters at EPA headquarters in early December.

But scientists and experts say the EPA’s new direction comes at a cost to public health, and would lead to far more pollutants in the environment, including mercury, lead and especially tiny airborne particles that can lodge in lungs. They also note higher emissions of greenhouse gases will worsen atmospheric warming that is driving more frequent, costly and deadly extreme weather.

Christine Todd Whitman, a longtime Republican who led the EPA under President George W. Bush, said watching Zeldin attack laws protecting air and water has been “just depressing.”

“It’s tragic for our country. I worry about my grandchildren, of which I have seven. I worry about what their future is going to be if they don’t have clean air, if they don’t have clean water to drink,” said Whitman, who joined a centrist third party in recent years.

The history behind EPA

FILE- A storm moves through a salt marsh at sunset Monday, Oct. 6, 2025, in Charleston, S.C. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel, File)

The EPA was launched under Nixon in 1970 with pollution disrupting American life, some cities suffocating in smog and some rivers turned into wastelands by industrial chemicals. Congress passed laws then that remain foundational for protecting water, air and endangered species.

The agency’s aggressiveness has always seesawed depending on who occupies the White House. Former President Joe Biden’s administration boosted renewable energy and electric vehicles, tightened motor-vehicle emissions and proposed greenhouse gas limits on coal-fired power plants and oil and gas wells. Industry groups called rules overly burdensome and said the power plant rule would force many aging plants to shut down. In response, many businesses shifted resources to meet the more stringent rules that are now being undone.

“While the Biden EPA repeatedly attempted to usurp the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law to impose its ‘Green New Scam,’ the Trump EPA is laser-focused on achieving results for the American people while operating within the limits of the laws passed by Congress,” EPA spokeswoman Brigit Hirsch said.

Zeldin’s list of targets is long

FILE – Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin listens during the annual Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference on June 3, 2025, in Anchorage, Alaska. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File)

Zeldin has announced plans to abandon soot pollution rules, loosen rules around harmful refrigerants, limit wetlands protections and weaken gas mileage rules. Meanwhile, he would exempt polluting industries and plants from federal emissions-reductions requirements.

Much of EPA’s new direction aligns with Project 2025, the conservative Heritage Foundation road map that argued the agency should gut staffing, cut regulations and end what it called a war on coal on other fossil fuels.

“A lot of the regulations that were put on during the Biden administration were more harmful and restrictive than in any other period. So that’s why deregulating them looks like EPA is making major changes,” said Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of Heritage’s Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment.

But Chris Frey, an EPA official under Biden, said the regulations Zeldin has targeted “offered benefits of avoided premature deaths, of avoided chronic illness … bad things that would not happen because of these rules.”

Matthew Tejada, a former EPA official under both Trump and Biden who now works at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said of the revamped EPA: “I think it would be hard for them to make it any clearer to polluters in this country that they can go on about their business and not worry about EPA getting in their way.”

Zeldin also has shrunk EPA staffing by about 20% to levels last seen in the mid-1980s.

Justin Chen, president of the EPA’s largest union, called staff cuts “devastating.” He cited the dismantling of research and development offices at labs across the country and the firing of employees who signed a letter of dissent opposing EPA cuts.

Relaxed enforcement and cutting staff

FILE – A bulldozer moves coal April 10, 2025, in Princeton, Ind. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel, File)

Many of Zeldin’s changes aren’t in effect yet. It takes time to propose new rules, get public input and finalize rollbacks.

It’s much faster to cut grants and ease up on enforcement, and Trump’s EPA is doing both. The number of new civil environmental actions is roughly one-fifth what it was in the first eight months of the Biden administration, according to the nonprofit Environmental Integrity Project.

“You can effectively do a lot of deregulation if you just don’t do enforcement,” said Leif Fredrickson, visiting assistant professor of history at the University of Montana.

Hirsch said the number of legal filings isn’t the best way to judge enforcement because they require work outside of the EPA and can bog staff down with burdensome legal agreements. She said the EPA is “focused on efficiently resolving violations and achieving compliance as quickly as possible” and not making demands beyond what the law requires.

EPA’s cuts have been especially hard on climate change programs and environmental justice, the effort to address chronic pollution that typically is worse in minority and poor communities. Both were Biden priorities. Zeldin dismissed staff and canceled billions in grants for projects that fell under the “diversity, equity and inclusion” umbrella, a Trump administration target.

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He also spiked a $20 billion “green bank” set up under Biden’s landmark climate law to fund qualifying clean energy projects. Zeldin argued the fund was a scheme to funnel money to Democrat-aligned organizations with little oversight — allegations a federal judge rejected.

Pat Parenteau, an environmental law expert and former director of the Environmental Law School at Vermont Law & Graduate School, said the EPA’s shift under Trump left him with little optimism for what he called “the two most awful crises in the 21st century” — biodiversity loss and climate disruption.

“I don’t see any hope for either one,” he said. “I really don’t. And I’ll be long gone, but I think the world is in just for absolute catastrophe.”

The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment