Trump Administration Targets Appliance Efficiency Standards: Legal Battles Likely to Follow

Nearly one month has passed since President Trump’s inauguration, and the new administration is beginning to execute its approach to water and energy efficiency standards for appliances and equipment. As was the case in 2016, the Trump administration is moving to slow and, where possible, roll back his predecessor’s efforts to strengthen efficiency requirements across a wide swath of household appliances and commercial and industrial equipment. While a statutory anti-backsliding provision is likely to be an obstacle to some of those efforts, we anticipate that, at minimum, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) will issue far fewer new and amended standards than it has over the prior four years and that it will seek to withdraw or limit the application of recently-adopted standards wherever possible. Absent activity under the Congressional Review Act, DOE’s deregulatory agenda will need to proceed via Agency rulemaking. We expect that such deregulatory actions will be challenged in court by coalitions of states and consumer and environmental groups.

WaterSense and EnergyStar

President Trump’s public statements called upon the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator to roll back water and energy efficiency standards, which prompted some initial confusion, as DOE, not EPA, administers the Appliance and Equipment Standards Program. Days later, EPA Administrator Zeldin provided greater clarity, announcing that EPA will overhaul recent water efficiency standards implemented under the WaterSense Program, a voluntary ecolabel, which recognizes products that use 20% less water than standard models. Note that even voluntary ecolabels like WaterSense have outsized impacts on appliance markets, partly because federal procurement contracts typically require that products meet those standards, and other institutional purchasers (state governments, municipalities, universities, etc.) often do as well. Furthermore, state appliance efficiency programs often use WaterSense specifications to set more stringent mandatory water efficiency standards. There are fewer statutory constraints on how the administration operates voluntary programs such as Energy Star and WaterSense, making it easier for the administration to chart a much different course than its predecessor and making it more difficult for opponents of these changes to challenge them in court.

While the Trump Administration has yet to announce any efforts to withdraw recently-adopted EnergyStar standards, we anticipate that the Administration will significantly scale back activity under both the WaterSense and EnergyStar programs in the coming years. With respect to enforcement, EPA has not announced any new EnergyStar product disqualifications since December of 2024, but it is too early to tell whether this reflects a change in enforcement posture by the Trump Administration or merely a delay in updating the publicly-available disqualification tracker.  

Mandatory Appliance and Equipment Program Standards

States and consumer and environmental NGOs repeatedly sued the first Trump administration over its alleged refusal to implement standards that the Obama administration finalized, its delay in adopting or decision not to adopt new and more stringent standards, and its efforts to narrow the scope of some standards and to create carve-outs to exempt sub-categories of products from other standards. Early moves by DOE and a more recent press release indicate that the new administration intends to renew these efforts. Therefore, we anticipate further rounds of litigation challenging DOE’s decision-making.

To date, despite a DOE press release heralding prompt action to undo “the previous administration’s burdensome policies that have driven up costs, reduced choice and diminished the quality of Americans’ home appliances,” the Department’s actions have been relatively modest. That same press release claims that DOE is pausing implementation of seven product standards, but it appears that only a subset of the paused rules are efficiency standards (the majority are new or amended procedures dictating how products are to be tested for compliance purposes). Nor did DOE explain in the press releases that it was merely pausing the effective dates of the rules until March 21, and that the compliance dates (i.e. the date by which newly manufactured or imported products must meet the new standards) were not being paused:

• Central Air Conditioners: On February 5, DOE announced that it was pausing the effective date of a Biden administration finalized amendment to the test procedure for central air conditioners and heat pumps. The delay of the effective date to March 21, 2025, does not affect the compliance date for this rule, which remains July 7, 2025. DOE is, however, seeking comment on any further delay of the effective date, including the impacts of such delay, as well as comment on the legal, factual, or policy issues raised by the rule.
• Clothes Washers and Dryers: On February 5, DOE announced that it was pausing the effective date of amendments to the clothes washer and dryer test procedure finalized by the Biden Administration. The delay of the effective date to March 21, 2025, does not affect the compliance date for this rule, which remains July 16, 2025. DOE is, however, seeking comment on any further delay of the effective date, including the impacts of such delay, as well as comment on the legal, factual, or policy issues raised by the rule.
• General Service Lamps: On February 5, DOE announced that it was pausing the effective date of amendments to the general service lamp test procedure finalized by the Biden Administration. The delay of the effective date to March 21, 2025, does not affect the compliance date for this rule, which remains July 15, 2025. DOE is, however, seeking comment on any further delay of the effective date, including the impacts of such delay, as well as comment on the legal, factual, or policy issues raised by the rule.
• Walk-In Coolers and Freezers: On February 20, DOE announced that it was pausing the effective date of recently-finalized amendments to the energy efficiency standard for walk-in coolers and freezers. The delay of the effective date to March 21, 2025, does not affect the compliance date for this rule, which remains December 23, 2027, for walk-in non-display doors and December 31, 2028, for walk-in refrigeration systems. DOE is, however, seeking comment on any further delay of the effective date, including the impacts of such delay, as well as comment on the legal, factual, or policy issues raised by the rule.
• Gas Instantaneous Water Heaters: On February 20, DOE announced that it was pausing the effective date of the new efficiency standard that was finalized by the Biden Administration. The delay of the effective date to March 21, 2025, does not affect the compliance date for this rule, which remains December 26, 2029. DOE is, however, seeking comment on any further delay of the effective date, including the impacts of such delay, as well as comment on the legal, factual, or policy issues raised by the rule.
• Commercial Refrigeration Equipment: While DOE has not yet published a notice that it is pausing the effective date of the new standards adopted by the Biden Administration in December of 2024, we anticipate that DOE will do so in the coming days.
• Air Compressors: While DOE has not yet published a notice that it is pausing the effective date of the amended test procedure adopted by the Biden Administration in December 2024, we anticipate that DOE will do so in the coming days.

DOE may face strong headwinds if it attempts to withdraw the backstop standard for general service lamps (which has already triggered a phase-out of many incandescent lamps in favor of LEDs) because Congress established the standard by statute. In President Trump’s first term, DOE refused to implement that standard, prompting a number of states and NGOs to petition the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for relief. The Biden Administration ultimately reversed course, mooting those petitions, and DOE implemented the backstop standard, which has now been in force for years. 

If DOE does attempt to withdraw other efficiency standards that were finalized as part of DOE’s more typical rulemaking process, litigation will likely follow. Indeed, any efforts by DOE to loosen standards are likely to face a court challenge because DOE is generally prohibited from doing so under a statutory anti-backsliding provision, which provides that DOE “may not prescribe any amended standard which 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.” 42 U.S.C. § 6295(o)(1).

DOE has previously explored an alternate strategy for loosening standards without running afoul of the anti-backsliding provision, where the Department creates a new sub-category of products within an existing regulated product category and then excludes that sub-category from regulation. During President Trump’s first term, DOE proposed just such an approach for what it termed “short cycle” dishwashers, clothes washers and dryers, which it sought to exclude from the scope of existing water and energy efficiency standards for those products. The Biden Administration ultimately withdrew that rule after its initial effort to do so was remanded for further consideration by the 5^th Circuit. On February 14, DOE announced a new such effort, focusing on natural gas tankless water heaters, which DOE would seek to exclude from needing to meet new efficiency standards for gas-powered water heaters. DOE has not yet published that proposal in the Federal Register. Note that House Republicans have separately identified the gas-fired instantaneous water heater energy efficiency standard as a target under the Congressional Review Act.

Finally, because DOE is statutorily obligated to revisit and determine whether to strengthen its efficiency standards for each covered product category every six years, DOE will have to make such determinations for a number of covered products over the next four years.  To the extent DOE determines not to strengthen standards for existing covered products, it will have to publish and support those decisions, which will also be subject to judicial challenge.

Enforcement Outlook

After taking a very active and aggressive approach to enforcement under the Biden administration, including assessing the largest-ever civil penalty in the history of the Appliance and Equipment Standards Program, there are already some indications that enforcement will drop under the Trump administration. DOE routinely published press releases and documentation each month for settlements it reached to resolve alleged certification and standards violations. Yet, nearly two months into the new year, DOE has yet to publish any settlements. DOE has also terminated many probationary hires in the Office of the General Counsel. As a result, the Department will likely not have the same resources it had during the Biden administration to pursue enforcement.

B&D’s Consumer Products industry group works with local, U.S., and multinational companies that make, distribute, transport, or sell consumer products in a hyper-competitive and evolving consumer goods market to help them identify, understand, and comply with complex regulatory requirements throughout the product lifecycle.