DOE proposed eliminating its efficiency standards for compact residential clothes washers.
DOE’s rationales include:
- DOE has tentatively concluded that, while it has authority to issue regulations for standard-size washers, it lacks authority to issue regulations for compact clothes washers, unless it makes a determination to classify compact washers as a consumer product under 42 U.S.C. 6292(b).
- The efficiency standards for compact washers are not economically justified or consistent with the need for national water conservation, since “Consumers are best situated to decide whether a given product is economically justified, as that is precisely what the free market does best.”
- DOE has tentatively determined that there is no reliance interest in an unlawful regulation, and these regulations are unlawful because “not economically justified,” and “inconsistent with the policy of maximally reducing regulatory burdens.”