News/Commentary

The Biden admin war on appliances continues as green agenda targets water heaters

July 22, 2023 | | Print Article

President Joe Biden’s war on appliances marked yet another target as the green agenda aimed to regulate “almost everything that plugs in or fires up.”

As with most leftist efforts to undermine the liberties of Americans, the newest proposed regulations from the Department of Energy (DOE) came via a Friday news dump meant to be overlooked. Of course, having already come after things like gas stoves, furnaces and ceiling fans with onerous regulations, it should come as no surprise that water heaters are under fire from climate cultists.

In a press release from the DOE, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said Friday, “Today’s actions — together with our industry partners and stakeholders — improve outdated efficiency standards for common household appliances, which is essential to slashing utility bills for American families and cutting harmful carbon emissions.”

“This proposal reinforces the trajectory of consumer savings that forms the key pillar of Bidenomics,” she touted, “and builds on the unprecedented actions already taken by this Administration to lower energy costs for working families across the nation.”

Unprecedented was perhaps an understatement as the House Oversight and Accountability Committee had already called out the Environmental Protection Agency over emissions standards that also targeted America’s energy production.

“It is difficult to overstate the threat that the proposed performance standards pose to grid reliability in the United States,” the letter said of altruistic goals that would impact nearly 3,400 power plants responsible for over 60 percent of American electricity production.

The statement from the Energy Department went on to boast that the proposed regulations, the first update to efficiency standards since 2010, would amount to a savings of roughly $198 billion for consumers and an estimated cut of 501 million metric tons of carbon emissions over the span of three decades.

The press release put that into perspective claiming the cuts were roughly the same as the combined emissions of about half of all U.S. homes for one year.

With water heating said to account for approximately 13 percent of annual residential energy costs and use, the agency further talked about the suggested savings that appeared to rely on the offering of “tax credits, rebates, and other incentives.”

Naturally, the proposal included a soupçon of cronyism as the new rule, if adopted, would require water heater models produced in 2029 and beyond to use electric heat pump technology. The standard was proposed based on “consensus-based recommendations” that aligned with proposals from two of the largest water heater manufacturers which would no doubt benefit with smaller competitors being unable to adapt to changing their production lines to accommodate.

“It’s just spreading to more and more appliances. It seems that almost everything that plugs in or fires up around the house is either subject to a pending regulation or soon will be,” said Competitive Enterprise Institute senior Fellow Ben Lieberman to Fox News Digital.

“Consumers aren’t going to like any of it,” he went on. “These rules are almost always bad for consumers for the simple reason that they restrict consumer choice.”

On that point, the comments spoke for themselves.

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Kevin Haggerty
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