Docket Number EERE-2025-BT-STD-0018
Document Number 2025-08599
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Introduction
On May 16, the Department of Energy (DOE) published and requested comments on a series of proposed rules that aim to rescind multiple energy conservation standards for a variety of residential and commercial appliances. The proposed rule corresponding to this public interest comment, Energy Conservation Program: Rescinding the Amended Water Conservation Standards for Commercial Clothes Washers, is part of this series. This comment responds to DOE’s request for public input on “any reason to rescind or not rescind these regulations” and seeks clarification on the economic analysis underlying these proposed rescissions.
The Proposed Rescission
DOE intends to rescind its own water conservation standards for commercial clothes washers codified in 10 CFR 431.156, which were previously developed pursuant to the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPAct). In this proposed rule, the Department aims to restore water use requirements to the less stringent statutory baselines originally established by Congress in EPAct—a reversion it deems “economically justified.” DOE cites the inferior cleaning ability of water-efficient clothes washers and the accompanying restriction of consumer choice as support for this claim. While the proposed rule itself provides no estimates of economic costs or benefits, on a separate federal website, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) references this proposed rule as support for its claim that this rescission will result in $1.9 billion in savings. Despite this, DOE states that the proposed rule is “not a significant regulatory action” under Executive Order 12866 (EO 12866). EO 12866 defines significance very broadly; and a rule with an economic impact in the billions—an order of magnitude larger than the “economically significant” threshold of $100 million—should certainly qualify. Economically significant rules typically require a higher level of supporting analysis, namely a regulatory impact analysis (RIA).
The Importance of Evidence-Based Analysis
In accordance with the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946, DOE has published this proposed rule in the Federal Register and opened it to the public for review and comment. However, it is unclear how the public is supposed to evaluate the specifics of the proposed rule. It contains neither an RIA nor a reference to any external analysis. As such, DOE’s claim that the proposed rescission is economically justified lacks quantitative evidence. Furthermore, it is difficult to determine the origins of the standards targeted for removal due to discrepancies between the Regulation Identifier Number (RIN) assigned to the current proposed rule and the RIN of the preceding DOE rules that last amended water conservation standards for commercial clothes washers in 2014. This lack of intelligible analysis signals a significant deviation from the guiding principles of EO 12866, which stresses the importance of backing rulemaking with credible analysis: “Each agency shall assess both the costs and the benefits of the intended regulation and, recognizing that some costs and benefits are difficult to quantify, propose or adopt a regulation only upon a reasoned determination that the benefits of the intended regulation justify its costs.” While engaging in this analysis, agencies are instructed to “base [their] decisions on the best reasonably obtainable scientific, technical, economic, and other information concerning the need for, and consequences of, the intended regulation” and to “draft [their] regulations to be simple and easy to understand, with the goal of minimizing the potential for uncertainty and litigation arising from such uncertainty.” EO 12866 requires agencies to go beyond a mere “assessment” and complete a full regulatory impact “analysis” of the benefits and costs of any rules with expected annual impacts of $100 million or more (Section (6)(a)(3)(C)). Indeed, in the wake of Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, it is now imperative that agencies justify their regulatory decisions through benefit-cost analysis as part of the “reasoned decision-making” required by the Administrative Procedure Act.
The National Academies of Science (NAS) previously commissioned a report that offered recommendations for improving DOE’s analysis of its energy efficiency regulations. As members of that NAS committee noted in comments submitted on DOE’s 2021 proposed rule on energy conservation standards for residential clothes washers, DOE’s analysis was not consistent with the committee’s peer-reviewed “findings and recommendations for improving DOE’s methodology, and ultimately, the net social benefits of the appliance and equipment standards DOE establishes under EPCA [the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975].” Despite the flaws in the 2021 technical support document, DOE’s analysis was undeniably detailed (344 pages total). However, the same critiques are valid now. If DOE is to succeed against a court challenge to the current rule (and guard against future reversal), it cannot simply assert that its rescission is economically justified. DOE must present a reasoned case for why that previous analysis was unreliable or flawed and offer a defensible alternative analysis to support a different approach. The NAS committee recommendations may well provide DOE with the analytical tools to do so.
Recommendation
DOE should not attempt to rescind these regulations until it first conducts and publishes an RIA of the proposed rescission to quantify its effects and to judge how they would impact public welfare. It should use the NAS committee recommendations as a guide throughout this evaluation. Doing so could help DOE to determine the most beneficial set of tradeoffs to pursue through future rulemaking. Furthermore, it would provide intelligibility and legitimacy to any future determination DOE makes regarding the justification for the rule.