Republicans on the House Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs held a hearing Tuesday on the Department of Energy's proposed appliance efficiency standards aimed at regulating home kitchen appliances, arguing that the efforts will be costly and burdensome.
The hearing comes after the DOE unveiled in February its new “Energy Policy and Conservation Program," the proposed rule-making that would allow it to set new efficiency and conservation standards for consumer conventional cooking products, including gas stoves.
It said in a memo that the proposed rules would make at least half of U.S. stove models ineligible for repurchase in stores if they were to come into force today.
In particular, GOP lawmakers sought to argue in the hearing that the DOE's proposed kitchen appliance rules are a violation of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act, the federal program that in 1979 directed the DOE to establish energy conservation standards for consumer products.
