His choice, he can afford it, so why not?
$136.00 for a 45kg delivered and installed in a rural area - not complaining. Cheaper than 9kg refills anywhere locally x 5. Other issue is the carting and changing cylinders. Rental on a 45kg LPG cylinder $20.00 annually.
In NSW we get $121.00 back annually from NSW Government for using 45kg cylinders.
Issue with Autogas no longer inexpensive. Major issue Autogas is mixture of propane and butane. Butane freezes at 0C and wont gasify. What happens you end up using all the propane and the Butane gets left behind you cannot use. We get temperatures as low as -16C and less than 0C nearly every winter night.
I do have an adaptor to fill 9kg LPG cylinders from autogas pump, but no longer use it with the price of autogas. Autogas in rural areas is all propane as they only send one truck. When travelling we know where to go where they refill LPG cylinders and only charge you for the litres/weight they fill. Some places are still doing $20 - $25 9kg cylinder refills.
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I donāt consider that particularly expensive, as you said itās cheaper than 9 kg cylinders, my son isnāt poor, heās not silly either. He would have done his homework.
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Seems clear to me !! 
https://www.elgas.com.au/blog/446-lpg-lpg-gas-lp-gas-bbq-gas-autogas-or-what/
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That is for the supply of gas. Developers had to provide gas mains on an estate. Builders maybe had to put a connection and gas meter on the site as part of building a home.
Not any requirement to actually use it for appliances like hot water systems.
The interest for me is why a gas hot water system could be mandated for a home build when there is no mains gas provided.
The only explanation so far I can think of is that the functionary responsible for building approvals had a good financial interest in a gas bottle supply company.
But surely not!
Or as I originally proposed, the builder just put in a gas hot water system because that may be the default option if a home owner doesnāt specify something else like electric heat pump, or roof solar hot water.
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Under the NSW BASIX environmental building standards at the time/currently, it is not mandated as such directly.
If you want to install a traditional storage hot water system has to be offset with PV.
I do have PV, FIT pays for my LPG. I did not have PV at the time of construction and completion certificate, and consequently had to comply at the time of completion. I had PV installed as soon as possible after completion - which was probably six months, in a rural area a satisfactory achievement. Organised six to get done and installer came from Newcastle. Had my shed built with 27 degree pitch roof for the solar facing magnetic north.
Instantaneous LPG with a 7 star rated instantaneous LPG system with temperatures controllers in the bathroom and kitchen is highly economical, especially if the correct sized instantaneous hot water system is installed. In my case only have a Rinnai 16 installed which has a capability of 16L min. Where larger capacity systems are installed for example the nearly standard 28L unit, and you are only using one tap, the LPG usages is considerably higher. In my climate with the water generally 2C to 5C in winter, you could only run one tap at 60C on the 16L unit. Often I am not home overnight or away for a week to two weeks fairly frequently to months at a time, when away for a short time donāt have to switch off the hot water and when get back wait for it to heat. If I am home in winter only shower every second day, so donāt have a tank of hot water sitting there doing nothing chewing power. If a power failure which is quite common on our long power lines, I still have hot water and cooking with my LPG.
45kg bottled LPG in my situation is actually cheaper than mains gas in my area.
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Not to worry about the supply of gas in NSW, at least.
As @Monica_D pointed to for NSW there are are several HWS options available when assessing home energy efficiency.
How well might the average consumer interpret the marketing and commercial agreements for a new home and land package? There are those in the Choice community with a keen eye for detail. Also well tuned to seeing past the puffery and ambiguity intended to evade closer scrutiny.
P.S.
Itās typical of the on line marketing for a new build these days one cannot simply explore the fine print of inclusions and contract T&Cs without first logging in as an interested customer. All the better to help the consumer find the most relevant content and avoid looking at misleading or unreliable. The contracts for construction of a new home are subject to state/territory regulation. Advice is often to seek the support of a legal professional before signing. It remains to answer how a consumer could be put in a situation where they believe they must use LPG for their HWS.
Which kind of shows the silliness of āone size fits allā government rules. For your climate, it totally makes sense to avoid a storage heater, with the current constraints. For my climate, there is no reason to avoid it, but thereās always a CO2 reason to avoid putting in gas (and yet I would not want to spring for a heat pump system). (I do now have PV, so that changes the equation again, but that was added many years after the house was built. And as the rules do change from time to time, I have no idea whether my house was compliant at the time it was built, as I didnāt commission the build.)
ā¦ electricity from the PV? (I hear you though. LOL.)
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I would like to hear from the son of @vivhalaska as to why his newly built home had to have a gas hot water system. When no gas is supplied on the estate.
Rather than this second-hand vague things about this and that.
Because there seems to be a real problem in this story. I donāt believe at all that such a building regulation or restriction exists. Anywhere.
Building Covenants can be very restrictive, ours stipulates the allowed colours, the allowed materials, the shed needs the approval of the developers before seeking Council approval, what is planted in front gardens needs the developer approval, the fences are all the same and we had to get developer approval for the very front fence. If we sell the property we are required to put the same covenants on the contract with the new purchaser. It has noise limitation requirements, cars/vehicles are not to be serviced on the property. So to have what energy supply is allowed as a requirement, does not surprise me.
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In some ways yes. I donāt see too many that take an interest in what you do inside your house, if it affects the look of the street or district or the amenity of the neighbours yes, but equipment that is installed indoors no. The Ridgeway control plan is all about use of the block, layout, offsets, colours, fences, garages, trees, landscaping etc
Solar hot water, PV, gas bottles, storage heater tank, ā¦ are all potentially / actually / usually outside.
Has anybody found evidence where any of those matters are made compulsory?
We had to get approval for the placement and number of panels for our new house under the covenant. No gas is allowed in the development other than portable gas bottles for BBQs and they are not allowed to be left at the side of the house, they must be in the undercover back porch if being stored outside. They have very restrictive covenants for the properties.
Compulsory by any level of government (at this time)? No.
Compulsory by the developer of the estate? Yes.
As The Ridgeway is a land development, the building guidelines would be set by state and local council. Not the developer.
Would you clarify āland developmentā as compared to āother estate developmentā? The estate I live in was once a farm and orchard and there are myriad deed restrictions overlaying state and council requirements. From the linked sources it appears the lots are subject to a strata per
The Ridgeway Design Guidelines
[Step 2]
Submits DA and Design Plans to Strata for approval.
and neither there nor the Sutherland Shire seems to dictate energy type although the former references minimum solar exposure and the latter references energy efficiency. I can imagine a certain overall energy efficiency score might have been required and developers being profit driven would take the lowest cost method to achieve one that passes. It is clear there is no gas reticulation.
Rather than speculate further on the if, how, and why perhaps time to inhale and pause pending further specific information.
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Examples please and the legal basis for them doing so.
Possibly hypothetical at this point in time, at least for Ridgeway. The best answer will be in the marketing and packaging of the product, referring to @PhilT recent observations.
@vivhalaska indicated they would attempt to provide further details of what transpired.
2015 was the last time we seriously looked at designer house and land packages, NQ. Iāll not confuse the current discussion, just to note they had several difficult to justify (IMO) requirements on the builds.
My estate has pages of deed covenants in the contracts that are perpetually applied to subsequent owners. That is VIC. Here is a reference for NSW
https://rg-guidelines.nswlrs.com.au/land_dealings/dealings_involving/covenants
