The Department of Energy (DOE) has published several proposals to temporarily postpone the effective date of four final rules. The temporarily postponed effective dates range from May to July for:
• Test procedures for central air conditioners and heat;
• Test procedures for certain walk-in cooler and freezer components;
• Test procedures for certain varieties of compressors; and,
• Energy conservation standards for ceiling fans.
The temporary extension of the effective date was necessary to give the newly appointed Secretary of Energy the opportunity for further review and consideration of new regulations. In addition to the above mentioned equipment standards, DOE has also published a temporary postponement of the effective date of a recently published final rule amending the baseline federal building standards until September 30, 2017. This is important because many of federal government’s energy reduction mandates are based off of a percentage reduction from this baseline. Moving the baseline “up” removes many common sense options and favors more radical and expensive options.
These actions were published to give the newly appointed Secretary of Energy the opportunity for further review and consideration of new regulations. Since the Secretary did not begin work in his position until March 3, he was unable to accomplish the review and consideration during the original blanket postponement of the effective date of the regulations. Therefore, DOE postponed the effective date of that energy conservation standards regulation to allow the Secretary the opportunity to accomplish this task.
In addition to continuing to press DOE to remand the furnace rule, commercial boilers and commercial water heaters standards, APGA continues to advocate for larger regulatory reform.
For questions on this article, please contact Dan Lapato of APGA staff by phone at 202-464-2742 or by email at
dlapato@apga.org.