Governor Kathy Hochul recently got caught up in a big “brouhaha” about whether or not she was backing a policy of making natural gas stove cooking illegal. She immediately responded that she was not… and that this would only happen with new construction at some distant time in the future.

Governor Hochul’s problem is that the Democratic Party has, in general, been mouthing an all-electric energy policy, and on most occasions, Democrats from the progressive wing of the Party take the opportunity, when given, to trash the fossil fuel industry.

This comes at the same time that other energy policies they support–like the closing down of the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in Westchester County — add to the need for more natural gas power generation to maintain the load on the grid.

(The fossil fuel percentage of electricity consumed in the New York City area is close to 80% and went up about 10% when the Indian Point Nuclear Plant was shut down last year.)

Another example of energy policy double-speak came recently at the federal level. As many in Washington crow about reducing the consumption of natural gas, the President came out and promised that the United States would double or triple its exports of Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) to Europe because the Russians are cutting back on selling their pipeline gas — a consequence of the war in Ukraine. What? In New York natural gas is treated as a polluting pariah. You mean people actually need it?

The public is not dumb. “You cannot have your cake and eat it to.” You cannot tell your citizenry they can’t have natural gas for stoves or heat, while you still are burning it to heat the Governor’s mansion and keep the State Capitol building warm. You cannot tell the public that you are cutting back on emissions by mandating all-electric cars, while at the same time you increase the natural gas consumption required to make the electricity to charge the batteries that run those cars.

I call this “energy policy duplicity.” If you are really going to be anti-natural gas, as New York says it is, tell the people, be honest about it.

The truth is that New York State has stopped the production of natural gas in the state because it banned the drilling and completion science required to produce it. Now, to stop its consumption — is just the logical conclusion of an anti-natural gas strategy. Fess up to it.

“Yes, we in New York are going to stop the use of natural gas. As to what we will replace it with and what that will cost–we will tell you that later.”

I am not much of a political forecaster. For example, I never thought that Donald Trump could become President. (What did I know?)

However, in the case of energy, how it is produced, used and what it will cost–that, I believe, is an issue that now clouds the future for the Democratic Party.

Back in the old days, there were still some “Blue Dog” Democrats in the Congress who came from energy-producing states like Texas and Oklahoma. Now, there are hardly any left. Perhaps, the last well-known remaining one is Senator Joe Manchin from West Virginia. Representation from such places injected some reality into the energy policy espoused by Democrats.

Today’s Democrats are hinging their future on “if-come” energy policies which may never happen, and which could well be unaffordable.

They are “shooting themselves in the foot.” They need a balanced energy policy which moves us forward toward a cleaner energy future, while, at the same time, allows the nation to grow and prosper.

Rolland Kidder is a Stow resident.