Right after Christmas, Team Biden, in an effort to put an exclamation point on its sad, pointless climate agenda, finished a regulation that set new efficiency standards for gas tankless water heaters and effectively eliminated the lowest-priced versions of these water heaters. [emphasis, links added]
This regulation, finished just as a dying administration walked out the door, was exactly what the Congressional Review Act [CRA] was designed to address. The act allows Congress and the president to strike down recently established rules.
In this instance, there is more to the story that should give pause to anyone who cares about American jobs.
The National Appliance Energy Conservation Act, approved in 1987, requires that household appliances meet efficiency standards and that the Department of Energy periodically review and, if needed, update the standards.
The Energy Department started such a review of water heaters in 2021.
The process is more complicated than you might think. There are different kinds of water heaters: traditional storage tank heaters that heat and store 30 to 80 gallons of water and tankless water heaters that heat water as it passes through the pipes.
For whatever reason, Team Biden issued two regulations for water heaters: new standards for traditional storage tank water heaters in May and new standards for tankless water heaters on Dec. 26.
Only the standards for tankless water heaters are within the time frame the CRA sets for reviewing new rules. As a consequence, only those standards are subject to congressional review.
In a rational world, the fact that Congress can disapprove of only one of these rules when both deal with water heaters would be enough to kill the idea.
Who would be loopy enough to want different regulations for the same appliances? Unfortunately, Congress is not always rational.
This story has one additional unhappy twist. About 80% of water heaters sold yearly in the United States are traditional storage tank heaters manufactured by U.S. companies. Almost all tankless water heaters are manufactured in foreign nations, mostly Japan, South Korea, and China.
That means if Congress goes ahead with the resolution of disapproval, American-made water heaters will be subject to new rules while primarily imported water heaters will not.
Tankless water heaters could be permanently exempted from regulation because the CRA precludes any attempt to impose regulations that are “substantially the same” as those Congress has rejected.
We can all agree that subjecting the best, most affordable, and most popular appliance — the one that has been made in the U.S. for decades — to onerous regulation while exempting foreign-made products from any regulation at all is neither wise nor aligned with any vision that places American companies, American workers and American families first.
I am a big fan of the CRA and was fortunate enough to work on it when it went through the legislative process in 1996.
However, the CRA is the wrong tool here, and it will lead to bad outcomes for American companies and workers. Congress should do nothing in this instance.
A lawsuit has been filed in federal court seeking to invalidate the tankless water heater rule. The administration should settle that case and send the rule back to the Department of Energy for further review. Energy Secretary Chris Wright has said he wants the rule returned to him so it can be fixed.
Once the Energy Department receives the rule, it can invalidate Team Biden’s rule, treat tank and tankless water heaters the same, and protect American manufacturing, consumer choice, and workers.
Read rest at Washington Times
