[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 79 (Tuesday, April 24, 2018)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 17768-17777]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-08521]
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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
10 CFR Part 430
Energy Conservation Program: Energy Conservation Standards for
Dishwashers, Notification of Petition for Rulemaking
AGENCY: Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Department of
Energy.
ACTION: Notification of petition for rulemaking; request for comment.
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SUMMARY: On March 21, 2018, the Department of Energy (DOE) received a
petition from the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) to define a
new product class under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA)
for residential dishwashers. The new product class would cover
dishwashers with a cycle time of less than one hour from washing
through drying. Through this notification, DOE seeks comment on the
petition, as well as any data or information that could be used in
DOE's determination whether to proceed with the petition.
DATES: Written comments and information are requested on or before June
25, 2018.
ADDRESSES: Interested persons are encouraged to submit comments,
identified by ``Dishwasher Petition,'' by any of the following methods:
Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the
instructions for submitting comments.
Mail: Appliance and Equipment Standards Program, U.S. Department of
Energy, Building Technologies Office, Mailstop EE-5B, 1000 Independence
Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. If possible, please submit all
items on a compact disc (CD), in which case it is not necessary to
include printed copies.
Hand Delivery/Courier: Appliance and Equipment Standards Program,
U.S. Department of Energy, Building Technologies Office, 950 L'Enfant
Plaza SW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20024. Telephone: (202) 586-6636.
If possible, please submit all items on a CD, in which case it is not
necessary to include printed copies.
Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents, or
comments received, go to the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Elizabeth Kohl, U.S. Department of
Energy, Office of the General Counsel, 1000 Independence Avenue SW,
Washington, DC 20585. Email: [email protected]; 202-586-7796.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5
U.S.C. 551 et seq., provides among other things, that ``[e]ach agency
shall give an interested person the right to petition for the issuance,
amendment, or repeal of a rule.'' (5 U.S.C. 553(e)) Pursuant to this
provision of the APA, CEI petitioned DOE for the issuance of a new
rule, as described in this notification and set forth below,
verbatim.\1\ In promulgating this petition for public comment, the
Department of Energy is seeking views on whether it should grant the
petition and undertake a rulemaking to consider the proposal contained
in the petition. By seeking comment on whether to grant this petition,
the Department of Energy takes no position at this time regarding the
merits of the suggested rulemaking.
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\1\ Attachments and data submitted by CEI with its petition for
rulemaking are available in the docket at http://www.regulations.gov.
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On March 21, 2018, CEI petitioned DOE to initiate a rulemaking to
define a new product class under 42 U.S.C. 6295(q) for residential
dishwashers. (The petition is presented at the end of this document.)
The new product class would cover dishwashers with a cycle time of less
than one hour from washing through drying. CEI did not suggest specific
energy and water requirements for this new product class, stating that
these details could be determined during the course of the rulemaking.
CEI stated that dishwasher cycle times have become dramatically longer
under existing DOE energy conservation standards, and that consumer
satisfaction/utility has dropped as a result of these longer cycle
times. CEI also provided data regarding the increase in dishwasher
cycle time, including data that correlated increased cycle time with
DOE's adoption of amended efficiency standards for dishwashers.
CEI cites to section 6295(q) of EPCA as the authority for DOE to
undertake the requested rulemaking. Section 6295(q) requires that DOE,
for a rule prescribing an energy conservation standard for a type (or
class) of covered products, specify a level of energy use or efficiency
higher or lower than the level that applies (or would apply) to such
type (or class) for any group of covered products that have the same
function or intended use, if DOE determines that covered products
within such group either: (1) Consume a different kind of energy from
that consumed by other covered products within such type (or class); or
(2) have a capacity or other performance-related feature that other
products within such type (or class) do not have, and such feature
justifies a higher or lower standard from that which applies (or will
apply) to other products within such type (or class). In making a
determination under paragraph (q) concerning whether a performance-
related feature justifies a higher or lower standard, DOE must consider
such factors as the utility to the consumer of
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the feature, and other appropriate factors. In any rule prescribing a
higher or lower level of energy use or efficiency, DOE must explain the
basis on which the higher or lower level was established. CEI asserts
that given the significant amount of consumer dissatisfaction with
increased dishwasher cycle time, cycle time is a ``performance-related
feature'' that provides substantial consumer utility, as required by
EPCA for the establishment of a product class with a higher or lower
energy use or efficiency standard that the standard applicable to other
dishwasher product classes.
CEI also cites to 42 U.S.C. 6295(o)(4), which prohibits DOE from
prescribing a standard that interested person have established by a
preponderance of the evidence would likely result in the unavailability
in the United States in any covered product type (or class) of
performance characteristics, features, sizes, capacities, and volumes
that are substantially the same as those generally available in the
United States at the time of DOE's finding. CEI states that despite
this prohibition, it appears that dishwasher cycle time have been
impaired by the DOE standards and that many machines with shorter cycle
times are no longer available.
In its petition, CEI proposes a cycle time of 1 hour as the
defining characteristic for the suggested new product class, because 1
hour is substantially below all current products on the market. CEI
states that energy efficiency standards for current products would
therefore not change with the addition of the new product class, and
that no backsliding would occur for the energy standards already in
place. Specifically, 42 U.S.C. 6295(o)(1) prohibits DOE from
prescribing a standard that increases the maximum allowable energy use,
or in the case of showerheads, faucets, water closets or urinals, water
use, or decreases the minimum required energy efficiency, of a covered
product.
Submission of Comments
DOE invites all interested partied to submit in writing by June 25,
2018 comments and information regarding this petition.
Submitting comments via http://www.regulations.gov. The http://www.regulations.gov web page will require you to provide your name and
contact information prior to submitting comments. Your contact
information will be viewable to DOE Building Technologies staff only.
Your contact information will not be publicly viewable except for your
first and last names, organization name (if any), and submitter
representative name (if any). If your comment is not processed properly
because of technical difficulties, DOE will use this information to
contact you. If DOE cannot read your comment due to technical
difficulties and cannot contact you for clarification, DOE may not be
able to consider your comment.
However, your contact information will be publicly viewable if you
include it in the comment or in any documents attached to your comment.
Any information that you do not want to be publicly viewable should not
be included in your comment, nor in any document attached to your
comment. Persons viewing comments will see only first and last names,
organization names, correspondence containing comments, and any
documents submitted with the comments.
Do not submit to http://www.regulations.gov information for which
disclosure is restricted by statute, such as trade secrets and
commercial or financial information (hereinafter referred to as
Confidential Business Information (CBI)). Comments submitted through
http://www.regulations.gov cannot be claimed as CBI. Comments received
through the website will waive any CBI claims for the information
submitted. For information on submitting CBI, see the Confidential
Business Information section.
DOE processes submissions made through http://www.regulations.gov
before posting. Normally, comments will be posted within a few days of
being submitted. However, if large volumes of comments are being
processed simultaneously, your comment may not be viewable for up to
several weeks. Please keep the comment tracking number that http://www.regulations.gov provides after you have successfully uploaded your
comment.
Submitting comments via hand delivery, or mail. Comments and
documents submitted via hand delivery or mail also will be posted to
http://www.regulations.gov. If you do not want your personal contact
information to be publicly viewable, do not include it in your comment
or any accompanying documents. Instead, provide your contact
information on a cover letter. Include your first and last names, email
address, telephone number, and optional mailing address. The cover
letter will not be publicly viewable as long as it does not include any
comments.
Include contact information in your cover letter each time you
submit comments, data, documents, and other information to DOE. If you
submit via mail or hand delivery, please provide all items on a CD, if
feasible. It is not necessary to submit printed copies. No facsimiles
(faxes) will be accepted.
Comments, data, and other information submitted electronically
should be provided in PDF (preferred), Microsoft Word or Excel,
WordPerfect, or text (ASCII) file format. Provide documents that are
not secured, written in English and free of any defects or viruses.
Documents should not contain special characters or any form of
encryption and, if possible, they should carry the electronic signature
of the author.
Campaign form letters. Please submit campaign form letters by the
originating organization in batches of between 50 to 500 form letters
per PDF or as one form letter with a list of supporters' names compiled
into one or more PDFs. This reduces comment processing and posting
time.
Confidential Business Information. According to 10 CFR 1004.11, any
person submitting information that he or she believes to be
confidential and exempt by law from public disclosure should submit via
email, postal mail, or hand delivery two well-marked copies: One copy
of the document marked confidential including all the information
believed to be confidential, and one copy of the document marked non-
confidential with the information believed to be confidential deleted.
Submit these documents via email or on a CD, if feasible. DOE will make
its own determination about the confidential status of the information
and treat it according to its determination.
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Factors of interest to DOE when evaluating requests to treat
submitted information as confidential include (1) a description of the
items, (2) whether and why such items are customarily treated as
confidential within the industry, (3) whether the information is
generally known by or available from other sources, (4) whether the
information has previously been made available to others without
obligation concerning its confidentiality, (5) an explanation of the
competitive injury to the submitting person which would result from
public disclosure, (6) when such information might lose its
confidential character due to the passage of time, and (7) why
disclosure of the information would be contrary to the public interest.
It is DOE's policy that all comments may be included in the public
docket, without change and as received, including any personal
information provided in the comments (except information deemed to be
exempt from public disclosure).
DOE considers public participation to be a very important part of
its process for considering rulemaking petitions. DOE actively
encourages the participation and interaction of the public during the
comment period. Interactions with and between members of the public
provide a balanced discussion of the issues and assist DOE in
determining how to proceed with a petition. Anyone who wishes to be
added to the DOE mailing list to receive future notices and information
about this petition should contact Appliance and Equipment Standards
Program staff at (202) 586-6636 or via email at
[email protected].
Approval of the Office of the Secretary
The Secretary of Energy has approved publication of this
notification of petition for rulemaking.
Issued in Washington, DC, on April 18, 2018.
Daniel R. Simmons,
Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Energy Efficiency and Renewable
Energy.
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[FR Doc. 2018-08521 Filed 4-23-18; 8:45 am]
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