Department of Energy Releases New Standards for Furnaces and Boilers

After a delay of nearly 30 years, a program passed in 1978 during the Carter administration is finally being implemented by the Department of Energy (DOE). The DOE released on Friday guidelines for improving energy efficiency in hot water heaters, furnaces, and boilers, but the new standards will not take effect until 2015 and take 24 years to put in place.

The "fast tracking" of the new standards was started in February 2007, when the Department requested that Congress approve a streamlining process for residential and commercial appliances, shortening what the DOE described at the time as a three year review process into one that would only take 10 months to implement the changes.

The long range goal of the program is to update the standards of a wide variety of household appliances, including everything from dishwashers to heat pumps. Under the plan, the DOE has already amended standards for dishwashers and hot water heaters.

The DOE in a press release claims the new standards will lower carbon dioxide emissions by 7.8 million tons a year, or the equivalent of 2.6 million passenger vehicles.

"As a nation, we must find better and more ways to both conserve energy and use it more efficiently and productively. These amended standards will not only cut down on greenhouse gas emissions, but they also allow consumers to make smarter energy choices that will save energy and money," DOE Assistant Secretary of Energy for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Andy Karsner said.

The DOE said the new regulations would be online at the Federal Register on November 19, but a search of their database only pulled up the February request to Congress.

The thirty-year logjam in carrying out this process was broken in January 2006, according to the DOE. Since that time the DOE claims that the implementation of rules governing the four appliance groups is at "...a pace unprecedented in DOE's history." However, the Manhattan Project, carried out by the predecessor agency to the DOE managed to take from theory to reality the atomic bomb in a mere six years.

More appliance groups are under study for revised standards, and they include everything refrigerators, central air conditioners, furnaces, water heaters, clothes washers and dishwashers; as well as smaller, home equipment including ceiling fans, torchiers, dehumidifiers, and fluorescent and incandescent lights. Also covered, would be plumbing equipment, including showerheads, faucets and toilets.

"Improving appliance standards is a top priority of the Department of Energy," Karsner said.