The Biden administration passed a regulation on gas stoves on Monday after stressing that its goal was not to ban gas stoves and previously rejecting efforts by opposition organizations to overturn the regulation.
The Department of Energy’s (DOE) gas stove efficiency rule announced in January will take effect in January 2028 as expected, according to a Federal Register filing Monday. The final rule is less stringent than a 2023 proposal that was later scrapped, and nuances in the rulemaking process allowed the agency to roll back parts of the rule if it received a significant amount of negative public comment on the agenda, according to E&E News, but the DOE pushed through its rule despite objections from several Republican attorneys general and advocacy groups, including the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI).
According to E&E News, the Energy Department introduced the rule as a “direct final rule,” meaning there was no published proposal for the rule. The “direct final rule” process also allowed groups like CEI to leave comments on the rule, with a chance of getting the agency to weaken the rule.
In its comments, the CEI argued that the newer, less aggressive rule actually represents a weakening of the 2023 proposal, but should still be withdrawn because it represents an overreach of government authority and continues to be a policy that increases costs for American consumers, according to E&E News and the Federal Register filing. In addition to the CEI and some Republican attorneys general, the Administrative Law Clinic at Antonin Scalia Law School and other groups also voiced opposition to the DOE rule.
The Energy Department has claimed that the claim that the government wants to ban gas stoves is a “myth” and “misinformation.” Notably, Biden administration officials have filed an amicus curiae brief asking a federal court to overturn a decision that struck down Berkeley, California’s 2019 ban on gas hookups in new construction, a policy that would have allegedly prohibited the installation of gas stoves in newly constructed buildings.
“President Biden is committed to using every tool at the government’s disposal to lower costs for American families and create healthier communities – including energy efficiency measures like the one announced today,” said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm when the bill was released in late January.
The Energy Department’s rule applies to electric cooktops, gas cooktops, freestanding electric cooktops, freestanding gas cooktops and ovens. The rule will likely initially drive up the cost of certain models, but the Biden administration claims the policy will save Americans money on their bills over time by reducing the energy use of home stoves, according to the Washington Post.
“The new standards also require that only a small portion of models make modest energy efficiency improvements to achieve the level of efficiency that most of the market already has today,” the agency said in its January press release announcing the rule. “For example, about 97 percent of gas stove models and 77 percent of electric stove models on the market already meet these standards.”
According to a June 2023 Harvard CAPS Harris Poll, nearly 70% of respondents opposed measures that would essentially ban gas stoves. More than 80% of Republican respondents and 71% of independents opposed measures that would ban gas stoves, as did 55% of Democrats surveyed.
Beyond stoves, the Energy Department has also pushed through energy efficiency regulations for everyday items like water heaters, furnaces and pool pump motors. The Biden administration has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help state and local governments develop building codes to “decarbonize” buildings.
The DOE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
