The Biden administration’s regulations targeting appliances will likely make life considerably more expensive, energy policy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The administration’s rulemakings have covered key appliances like air conditioners, refrigerators, water heaters and furnaces, generally setting the market on course to feature energy efficient models — which are often more expensive — and marginalize less efficient alternatives. Cumulatively, the models the administration is pushing and their higher costs figure to impose hundreds or thousands of dollars of extra expenses on consumers, a burden that will hit working- and middle-class Americans hardest, according to policy analysts who spoke with the DCNF.
“We have not seen a situation where the newly mandated, more energy efficient, technically complex models are cheaper than the existing models while doing anything close to the same job for key consumer functions as the existing models,” O.H. Skinner, executive director of the Alliance for Consumers, told the DCNF. “What we are seeing is, in essence, what used to be available as a ‘pay more now for the more efficient model that might save you money over time in certain circumstances’ is effectively becoming the model that the government says must be produced instead of other cheaper options.”
The Alliance for Consumers has conducted its own research to determine how much more money Americans will spend on various appliances under the Biden administration’s regulations, finding that the policies will increase expenses for the average American home by more than $9,000.
REPORTER:
“We’ve seen them go after gas stoves…how many more home appliances will Americans eventually have to replace?” pic.twitter.com/JgjQyiPGK0
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 24, 2023
However, marginal savings on energy bills spread out over a long period of time may not be especially impactful given that many Americans cannot afford to wait through such a long payback period and that other Biden administration policies may drive up electricity prices in the future, Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Energy, Climate and Environment, told the DCNF. At the same time, Americans are spending more on appliances and more frequently today than they were 15 years ago, according to CNBC, trends that Furchtgott-Roth attributes in part to energy efficiency regulations.
“Poorer people can’t afford the immediate upfront cost of more expensive appliances,” Furchtgott-Roth told the DCNF. “The government is also raising wages, which makes it harder to get your current appliances fixed. So it becomes more expensive to get your appliances fixed, and you’re basically almost forced to buy a new one, because it’s harder to fix the current ones. So, it used to be that if a dryer broke, someone will come and fix your dryer, and it will work for another five years. Now, someone comes and says ‘Okay, you’ve got to buy a new dryer.’”
The appliances that Americans buy and use will also have little impact on global temperatures given that entire economies, like India and China, do not appear to be nearly close to transitioning away from fossil fuels anytime soon, Furchtgott-Roth added.
Neither the DOE nor the White House responded immediately to requests for comment.
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