WASHINGTON — The American Gas Association (AGA) has appealed to halt the implementation of ASHRAE 90.1-1999, which it says unfairly favors electric resistance space and water heating.

In its Aug. 5 appeal, AGA also says that the standard would penalize natural gas for space and water heating.

AGA claims the new standard contains “critical flaws” in its assumptions in the building envelope criteria — even though natural gas and other energy sources “are clearly more energy efficient and, over time, more cost effective than electric resistance heating.”

The appeal also says ASHRAE violated its own due process requirements, charging that the committee’s makeup “was overwhelmingly biased against natural gas suppliers.” This meant the committee “violated the spirit, if not the letter, of ASHRAE procedures governing committee balance.”

The appeal requests that the “offending passages” of the standard be suspended pending the changes it requests.