The legislation, which Mayor Bill de Blasio is expected to sign, requires electricity-powered heat and hot water in most new buildings under seven stories by 2024 and all other buildings in 2027.
“If built, Annova LNG would have destroyed wetlands, blocked a wildlife corridor threatening the survival of endangered wildlife, and put communities needlessly at risk,” said the Sierra Club in a statement.
The ban was supported by all four basin states — New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New York — putting a permanent end to hydraulic fracking for natural gas along the 13,539-square-mile basin, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
Energy minister Paul Wheelhouse says allowing unconventional extraction of coal and gas would put climate goals at risk
The majority, including a handful of Republicans, voted to ban the practice after hearing arguments that science shows that the risk of earthquakes, water contamination and health problems increases in fracked areas.
Fracking contamination got an honest reckoning in December 2016, when EPA scientists released the largest study of its kind and removed an earlier line claiming no systemic threat to drinking water. They found risks at every stage, from sourcing to wastewater storage. A quiet act of scientific self-correction, published as political winds blew the other way.
