Bill > HR4626

This bill, titled the Home Appliance Protection and Affordability Act, amends the Energy Policy and Conservation Act to establish stricter requirements for the Secretary of Energy when setting new or changing existing energy conservation standards for home appliances. Specifically, it mandates that any new or amended standard must be both technologically feasible and economically justified, meaning it must be possible to implement with current technology and not impose unreasonable costs on consumers. The bill also requires the Secretary to conduct thorough economic impact analyses, considering factors like costs to low-income households, regional differences, and lifecycle costs of products, and to ensure that any new standards do not result in additional net costs to consumers or lessen the utility or performance of the appliances. Furthermore, it introduces a process for petitioning to amend or revoke existing standards if they are found to increase consumer costs, fail to conserve significant energy or water, are not technologically feasible, or make products unavailable to consumers, and it prohibits the Secretary from setting new or revised standards for distribution transformers.

Agriculture and Natural Resources, Business and Industry

https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/4626/all-info