Industry Urges California to Drop Pursuit of Battery Charger Regulations

The California Energy Commission’s pursuit of energy efficiency standards is “unnecessary and wasteful” given that the U.S. Department of Energy is already working on national energy conservation standards for the devices, CEA and several other trade groups said. The groups urged the commission to reject a report from Pacific Gas & Electric and Ecos Consulting that it’s using as a basis for developing battery charger standards because the California utility and the consulting firm have “vested interests” in regulating the devices.

If the commission believes there’s energy savings to be had from battery charger standards in California, it should “recognize that those savings would be dramatically larger at the national level,” the groups said in a joint letter. California’s battery charger standards are to take effect around the DOE’s effective date and that would be an “extremely inefficient approach to supporting energy efficiency,” the group said. The commission’s approach also “suggests the potential for re-regulation or double-regulation” for external power supplies which are already regulated at the federal level, they said.

"For manufacturers to meet two sets of regulatory requirements within a narrow time frame is unnecessarily disruptive to the marketplace and would present serious cost impacts on a variety of businesses,” they said. Some manufacturers could also decide to stop making certain battery charger-related products “between the two sets of effective dates, which could result in product supply shortages and unnecessary economic loss for manufactures.” The other signatories to the letter are the Consumer Electronics Retailers Coalition, California Retailers Association, Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, CTIA, Tech America, PRBA-Rechargeable Battery Association, Toy Industry Association and the California Manufacturers and Technology Association.

Referring to the commission’s reliance on a report by PG&E and Ecos Consulting for its rulemaking, the group said the commission allowed “parties with vested interests and biases in favor of regulation continue to steer the commission’s energy efficiency policy activities.” PG&E has “interests in, or incentives for, shifting regulatory and cost burdens to others,” and Ecos has publicly supported “government-mandated energy efficiency standards,” they said. So it’s not surprising that the report recommends that the commission mandate regulations for battery charger products, they said. The report uses “stale and out-of-date data” to justify regulations, they said.