The ‘Don’t Mess With My Home Appliances Act’ protects consumer choices

By Ben Lieberman

This is a lightly edited excerpt of testimony recently provided to the U.S. House’s Energy and Commerce Energy subcommittee hearing, "Building the American Dream: Examining Affordability, Choice, and Security in Appliance and Buildings Policies."

H.R. 4626, the “Don’t Mess With My Home Appliances Act,” contains a number of very good ideas and deserves serious consideration. Best of all is its lookback provision, which would allow the Department of Energy to fix problems with existing regulations. 

As it is now, the antibacksliding provision in the Energy Policy and Conservation Act prevents the agency from revisiting regulations already on the books, no matter how badly they may have turned out. This commonsense reform was recommended in a National Academies of Sciences study and is long overdue.

The National Academies also recommended that the agency closely scrutinize each proposed new rule to determine whether it really is justified and would benefit consumers, and the bill contains several measures furthering this goal. This includes a more comprehensive analysis of costs – not just higher equipment costs but also higher installation costs, maintenance costs, reduced products lifetimes as well as other factors often downplayed or ignored by the agency. It also requires more analysis of any disproportionate impacts on low-income households who are hardest hit by these regulations.   

Preventing mission creep

In addition, the bill contains provisions explicitly forbidding climate considerations as well as fuel switching away from natural gas. These provisions are essential to preventing mission creep towards an environmental agenda that is at odds with the best interests of consumers.

It also quantifies what is considered significant conservation of energy so this requirement cannot be so easily sidestepped, and it makes the 3-year payback period a requirement rather than a suggestion.

However, the bill still leaves a lot to the discretion of the agency, and we have increasingly seen DOE willing to say just about anything in its analysis to get these regulations across the finish line, especially during the last administration. That is why we should take at least some regulatory authority off the table. For example, the appliances that have already been badly overregulated – dishwashers, washing machines and light bulbs are prime examples – could be exempted from any further rules.  And stoves is a category that should have never been regulated in the first place and ought to be excluded from this program. 

In addition, some of the problematic recent rules that missed the Congressional Review Act window and are still scheduled to take effect in the coming years also should be rescinded. If we can’t sunset the program entirely, we can at least limit the future damage to homeowners by some judicious pruning.  

Promoting consumer choice

It is important to note that there is no downside to not regulating.  Homeowners who want ultra-efficient appliances will still be free to choose them, and manufacturers have demonstrated that they will offer such models for that segment of the market that prefers them. But they will no longer be subject to federal mandates that force particular choices on everyone. 

Further, any and all efforts to deprive homeowners the option of natural gas appliances should be blocked. 

The choice of using natural gas or electricity ought to rest with the homeowner, not the government.  The “Don’t Mess With My Home Appliances Act” has provisions designed to preserve fuel choice, as does H.R. 3699, the “Energy Choice Act,” which restricts state and local gas bans. 

In addition, H.R.4758, the “Homeowner Energy Freedom Act” takes the critical step of ending several Inflation Reduction Act programs providing federal funding to pursue this unwanted agenda - needless to say, the American people don’t want to see our tax dollars spent to take away our energy choices. 

Note that this bill goes beyond the spending cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and completely revokes these programs.

In my view, the more we place limits on statutes like EPCA and the Inflation Reduction Act, the better for the American people. A good rule of thumb for appliance regulatory reform is that if you are expanding consumer choice you are doing the right thing, but if you are limiting consumer choice in favor of government restrictions, you are doing the wrong thing.

Read the full testimony here. 

Ben Lieberman is a Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

_{*The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of EnergyPlatform.News.}