Energy Conservation Program: Energy Conservation Standards for Dishwashers

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY <CFR>10 CFR Part 430</CFR> <DEPDOC>[EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1904-AF60</RIN> <SUBJECT>Energy Conservation Program: Energy Conservation Standards for Dishwashers</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Department of Energy. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Notice of proposed rulemaking. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Energy Policy and Conservation Act, as amended (“EPCA”), prescribes energy conservation standards for various consumer products and certain commercial and industrial equipment, including dishwashers. In this notice of proposed rulemaking, the U.S. Department of Energy (“DOE”) proposes amended energy conservation standards for dishwashers identical to those set forth in a direct final rule published elsewhere in this issue of the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . If DOE receives adverse comment and determines that such comment may provide a reasonable basis for withdrawal of the direct final rule, DOE will publish a notice of withdrawal and will proceed with this proposed rule. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> DOE will accept comments, data, and information regarding this NOPR no later than August 12, 2024. Comments regarding the likely competitive impact of the proposed standard should be sent to the Department of Justice contact listed in the <E T="02">ADDRESSES</E> section on or before May 24, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> See section IV of this document, “Public Participation,” for details. If DOE withdraws the direct final rule published elsewhere in this issue of the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> , DOE will hold a public meeting to allow for additional comment on this proposed rule. DOE will publish notice of any meeting in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . Interested persons are encouraged to submit comments using the Federal eRulemaking Portal at <E T="03">www.regulations.gov</E> under docket number EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039. Follow the instructions for submitting comments. Alternatively, interested persons may submit comments, identified by docket number EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039, by any of the following methods: (1) <E T="03">Email:</E> <E T="03">ApplianceStandardsQuestions@ee.doe.gov.</E> Include the docket number EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039 in the subject line of the message. (2) <E T="03">Postal Mail:</E> Appliance and Equipment Standards Program, U.S. Department of Energy, Building Technologies Office, Mailstop EE-5B, 1000 Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. Telephone: (202) 287-1445. If possible, please submit all items on a compact disc (“CD”), in which case it is not necessary to include printed copies. (3) <E T="03">Hand Delivery/Courier:</E> Appliance and Equipment Standards Program, U.S. Department of Energy, Building Technologies Office, 1000 Independence Ave. SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. Telephone: (202) 287-1445. If possible, please submit all items on a CD, in which case it is not necessary to include printed copies. No telefacsimiles (“faxes”) will be accepted. For detailed instructions on submitting comments and additional information on this process, see section VII of this document. <E T="03">Docket:</E> The docket for this activity, which includes <E T="04">Federal Register</E> notices, comments, and other supporting documents/materials, is available for review at <E T="03">www.regulations.gov.</E> All documents in the docket are listed in the <E T="03">www.regulations.gov</E> index. However, not all documents listed in the index may be publicly available, such as information that is exempt from public disclosure. The docket web page can be found at <E T="03">www.regulations.gov/docket/EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039.</E> The docket web page contains instructions on how to access all documents, including public comments, in the docket. See section VII of this document for information on how to submit comments through <E T="03">www.regulations.gov.</E> EPCA requires the Attorney General to provide DOE a written determination of whether the proposed standard is likely to lessen competition. The U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division invites input from market participants and other interested persons with views on the likely competitive impact of the proposed standard. Interested persons may contact the Antitrust Division at <E T="03">energy.standards@usdoj.gov</E> on or before the date specified in the <E T="02">DATES</E> section. Please indicate in the “Subject” line of your email the title and Docket Number of this proposed rulemaking. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Dr. Carl Shapiro, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Building Technologies Office, EE-5B, 1000 Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. Telephone: (202) 287-5649. Email: <E T="03">ApplianceStandardsQuestions@ee.doe.gov.</E> Ms. Amelia Whiting, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of the General Counsel, GC-33, 1000 Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. Telephone: (240) 306-7097. Email: <E T="03">Amelia.Whiting@hq.doe.gov.</E> For further information on how to submit a comment, review other public comments and the docket, or participate in the public meeting, contact the Appliance and Equipment Standards Program staff at (202) 287-1445 or by email: <E T="03">ApplianceStandardsQuestions@ee.doe.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Table of Contents</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">I. Synopsis of the Proposed Rule</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">II. Introduction</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Authority</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Background</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">1. Current Standards</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">2. Current Test Procedure</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">3. The Joint Agreement</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">III. Proposed Standards</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Benefits and Burdens of TSLs Considered for Dishwasher Standards</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Annualized Benefits and Costs of the Proposed Standards</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">IV. Public Participation</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Submission of Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Public Meeting</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">V. Severability</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">VI. Procedural Issues and Regulatory Review</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Review Under the Regulatory Flexibility Act</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">VII. Approval of the Office of the Secretary</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Synopsis of the Proposed Rule</HD> The Energy Policy and Conservation Act, Public Law 94-163, as amended (“EPCA”), <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> authorizes DOE to regulate the energy efficiency of a number of consumer products and certain industrial equipment. (42 U.S.C. 6291-6317) Title III, Part B of EPCA  <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> established the Energy Conservation Program for Consumer Products Other Than Automobiles. (42 U.S.C. 6291-6309) These products include dishwashers, the subject of this proposed rulemaking. (42 U.S.C. 6292(a)(6)) <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  All references to EPCA in this document refer to the statute as amended through the Energy Act of 2020, Public Law 116-260 (Dec. 27, 2020), which reflect the last statutory amendments that impact Parts A and A-1 of EPCA. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  For editorial reasons, upon codification in the U.S. Code, Part B was redesignated Part A. </FTNT> Pursuant to EPCA, any new or amended energy conservation standard must, among other things, be designed to achieve the maximum improvement in energy efficiency that DOE determines is technologically feasible and economically justified. (42 U.S.C. 6295(o)(2)(A)) Furthermore, the new or amended standard must result in significant conservation of energy. (42 U.S.C. 6295(o)(3)(B)) In light of the above and under the authority provided by 42 U.S.C. 6295(p)(4)(A)(i), DOE is proposing this rule amending the energy conservation standards for dishwashers and is concurrently issuing a direct final rule elsewhere in this issue of the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . DOE will proceed with this notice of proposed rulemaking (“NOPR”) only if it determines it must withdraw the direct final rule pursuant to the criteria provided in 42 U.S.C. 6295(p)(4). The amended standard levels in the proposed rule and the direct final rule were recommended in a letter submitted to DOE jointly by groups representing manufacturers, energy and environmental advocates, consumer groups, and a utility. This letter, titled “Energy Efficiency Agreement of 2023” (hereafter, the “Joint Agreement”  <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> ), recommends specific energy conservation standards for dishwashers that, in the commenters' view, would satisfy the EPCA requirements in 42 U.S.C. 6295(o). DOE subsequently received letters of support for the Joint Agreement from States including New York, California, and Massachusetts  <SU>4</SU> <FTREF/> and utilities including San Diego Gas and Electric and Southern California Edison  <SU>5</SU> <FTREF/> advocating for the adoption of the recommended standards. As discussed in more detail in the accompanying direct final rule and in accordance with the provisions at 42 U.S.C. 6295(p)(4), DOE has determined that the recommendations contained in the Joint Agreement comply with the requirements of 42 U.S.C. 6295(o). <FTNT> <SU>3</SU>  This document is available in the docket at: <E T="03">www.regulations.gov/comment/EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039-0055.</E> </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>4</SU>  This document is available in the docket at: <E T="03">www.regulations.gov/comment/EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039-0056.</E> </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>5</SU>  This document is available in the docket at: <E T="03">www.regulations.gov/comment/EERE-2019-BT-STD-0039-0057.</E> ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 104k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━