2004 has been a very busy year for appliance and equipment efficiency standards. On the legislative front, Connecticut and Maryland have enacted appliance standards legislation, and other bills stand a good chance of passage in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. California is now considering new standards on 20 products—standards which could become a model for other states and national standards.

While pending federal energy legislation is stalled over non-efficiency issues, when a bill moves, it will be likely to include standards on at least eight products—six already listed in the bill plus two more based on recent consensus agreements negotiated by ACEEE, industry, states, and other efficiency organizations. The two new products are ceiling fans and dehumidifiers. Negotiations with industry are underway on other products; we expect negotiations to be concluded soon on two products, and there are informal discussions about possible negotiations on six additional products. The target is to complete these discussions early in 2005, before new federal energy legislation takes shape in the opening months of the 109th Congress.

USDOE has also become more active on standards, publishing advanced notices of proposed rulemaking on three products: commercial packaged air conditioners, distribution transformers, and residential furnaces and boilers (view an ACEEE fact sheet on transformer standards). Information on the other two products will be posted at the same URL shortly. If DOE follows the schedule in its regulations, draft standards will be published during the summer of 2005 and a final rule in early 2006.