The Biden administration is cracking down on water heaters by imposing greater efficiency standards.
Consumers will have to shovel out thousands of dollars more to install a heat pump water heater rather than a conventional storage water heater in order to fall in line with new standards released on Friday by the Department of Energy.
If the proposal is adopted, by 2029, all new electric water heaters must deploy heat pump technology and all gas-fired ones will use condensing technology.
The Department of Energy estimates that if finalized, the measure will “save Americans approximately $198 billion and reduce 501 million metric tons of harmful carbon dioxide emissions over 30 years.”
Residential water efficiency standards were last updated in 2010, and it is essential these new standards be approved in order to “slash” utility bills, according to U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm.
President Joe Biden sits with California Gov. Gavin Newsom at the Lucy Evans Baylands Nature Interpretive Center and Preserve in Palo Alto, California, on Monday, June 19, 2023. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
“This proposal reinforces the trajectory of consumer savings that forms the key pillar of Bidenomics and builds on the unprecedented actions already taken by this Administration to lower energy costs for working families across the nation,” Granholm said.
Water heating consists of 13 percent of both annual residential energy use and consumer utility costs. The Department of Energy expects that the new efficiency standards would reduce energy use from home water heaters by 21 percent. A drastic cut in energy use means that consumers could save $1,868 on average over the life of the appliance.
However, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) argued on Twitter this move takes away consumer choice.
“Leave us alone,” Massie tweeted. “These products already exist in the free market. Consumers should decide whether the upfront cost of a heat-pump water heater is worth the possible long term savings. In many cases, the monthly savings never make up for the upfront cost of the equipment.”
In addition, the Department of Energy implemented efficiency standards for 60 categories of home appliances and equipment consisting of 90 percent of home energy use.
The new efficiency standards come months after the Biden administration stirred up a frenzy when the Biden Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. said on air that banning gas stoves was not off the table, Breitbart News reported.
