The U.S. Department of Energy, despite issuing revised data showing consumers would save even less money and energy under DOE's proposed gas cooking appliance standard, still has not made any changes to the standard level it previously proposed. This means consumers could still lose features and access to many currently available gas cooking appliance models – in exchange for saving only pennies each month – if the proposed standard takes effect. It is unclear how DOE will use the revised data and analysis moving forward.

DOE’s data revisions were appropriately made in response to comments on its proposed standard for gas cooking appliances, and the department has made some progress towards improving its analysis. The newly released DOE analysis revises downward the potential energy savings from its original cooking product rulemaking proposal, showing that the savings are even less than DOE originally projected and are almost negligible. DOE’s original proposal was to save consumers 13 cents per month in utility costs over the life of gas cooking products. The revised data reduces consumer savings to just 9 cents per month.

The changes in energy savings projected by DOE primarily result from DOE recognizing that the currently available cooking products are more efficient than its earlier analysis assumed.

Additionally, AHAM, in its original comments, pointed out several consumer features that need to be protected, such as high-input rate burners, simmer burners and continuous grates. AHAM also proposed approaches and efficiency levels to support these features.

AHAM urges DOE to reconsider the extremely stringent levels it proposed so that manufacturers can provide the features and performance that consumers expect at the costs they can afford.

Copyright © acrofan All Right Reserved