Inwood Building Shocked By Con Ed's $3M Natural Gas Estimate

INWOOD, NY — An Inwood building's attempt to convert to natural gas has become a nightmare after receiving an estimate from Con Edison in the millions of dollars.

Hal Fuchsman, the president of the 50-unit Inwood Park Apartments co-op in Upper Manhattan, began the process of replacing the building's old school oil-boiling boiler with a newer model in order to meet the upcoming demands of the Climate Mobilization Act.

Fuchsman says in a letter sent to elected officials this week that the old boiler is responsible for around 84 percent of the building's CO2 emission, and converting to natural gas with a new boiler would reduce the building-wide emissions by around 23 percent.

The Inwood building hired an outside agency to estimate the cost of the conversion, which told the building it would run them around $212,500 to make the switch, with an additional $10,000 to $15,000 for street construction to accommodate a new gas line.

With the estimate in hand, the co-op submitted the project to Con Edison for review and service determination.

Fuchsman calls the energy company's response "shocking and unexpected."

Con Edison told the Inwood co-op that it would cost them $3,050,886.86 to replace the boiler and convert it to natural gas.

The astronomical price was justified by Con Edison's claim that it had to use "high-pressure service" to make the conversion.

A service that the outside agency did not think needed to be done to make the conversion.

"Instead, ConEd required that the job be done using high-pressure service," Fuchsman wrote in his letter to uptown elected officials. "However, since no such high-pressure service exists in our area, they will require our housing cooperative to upgrade the surrounding neighborhood’s infrastructure to high-pressure by paying them to run 2,400 feet (0.46 miles) of new high-pressure gas main for the astounding price of $3,050,886.86.5."

"This is a sum that our building, and no similar building for that matter, could ever conceivably afford," he added.

A spokesperson from Con Edison provided the following statement to Habitat Magazine, which was the first publication to report on the Inwood building's $3 million charges.

“The cost estimate provided would cover the work needed to bring in natural gas from a different main, the closest of which is nearly half a mile away. Con Edison covers the first 100 feet of main for any building, but the cost for work beyond that is covered by the customer making the upgrade and is not passed along to other customers in rates.”

The Inwood co-op is now left with two options.

It could call off the conversion project and begin paying $19,000 in fines a year in 2025 related to the Climate Mobilization Act and $46,000 a year beginning in 2030. Or it could switch to more expensive oil, which would lower emissions and reduce the looming annual fines.

Fuchsman sent his letters asking for help in the situation to the following elected officials:

• Council Member Carmen De La Rosa
• Speaker Adrienne Adams, New York City Council
• Hon. Eric Adams, Mayor of New York City
• Senator Robert Jackson
• New York State Senate AD 72 New York State Assembly c/o Speaker Carl E. Heastie

"Reduction of carbon emissions is an important and laudable endeavor," Fuchsman wrote in the letter. "However, these inflexibly written laws in conjunction with public utilities’ unwillingness to provide the necessary service are both counterproductive and are failing your fellow New Yorkers."

You can read his full letter here.