The city’s ambitious proposals will require no fossil fuels to be used in new housing or commercial developments, including for heating and cooking.
ADVERTISEMENTOxford city council has announced plans to ban gas stoves in new buildings by 2025. It’s part of the English city’s ambition to build all new developments to run without fossil fuels.
The council made the move as part of its new local plan that prioritises addressing the climate emergency.
“The Local Plan is a major step forward in how we will tackle the existential threat of climate change,” Councillor Louise Upton said last month following the publication of a draft of the plan. “It will require all new homes and businesses in Oxford to generate enough electricity to cover their needs, to operate without using fossil fuels, and to plant more trees.”
The council has since adopted this draft and opened a consultation with the 162,000-strong population of Oxford.
This will be taken into account for creating a final draft of the plan which will be submitted to the Government’s Planning Inspectorate. A public inspection will then take place and it could be adopted by summer 2025.
Are gas stoves bad for your health?
According to the International Energy Agency 26 per cent of global energy-related emissions come from the operations of buildings (8 per cent being direct emissions in buildings and 18 per cent indirect emissions from the production of electricity and heat).
Aside from their contribution to this number, gas stoves also breach air pollution limits in homes and increase the risk of children developing health problems, a major report published earlier this year found.
More than 700,000 cases of child asthma in the EU in the past year were linked to cooking on gas at home, says the report. This figure represents around 7 per cent of all asthma cases in children across the bloc.
Where in Europe is banning gas stoves?
Some 100 million people in the EU use gas cookers, including more than half of all homes in Italy, the Netherlands, Romania and Hungary.
Since 2018, there has been a ban on connecting newly built houses and apartments to the gas network in the Netherlands, and Denmark has a similar ban.
Gas stoves have become a partisan issue in the US
Elsewhere it has become a divisive topic. When rumours that gas stoves could be banned circulated in the US earlier this year Republican Congressman Ronny Jackson posted on X, formerly known as Twitter: “I’ll NEVER give up my gas stove. If the maniacs in the White House come for my stove, they can pry it from my cold dead hands. COME AND TAKE IT!!”
In May, New York became the first state to ban gas stoves. The installation of fossil-fuel equipment in new builds will be outlawed in 2026 for buildings under nine stories and 2029 for larger buildings.
However, gas and construction trade groups filed a lawsuit in October to block the rule, claiming the state’s ban is unenforceable under federal law.
