Energy Conservation Standards for Commercial Water Heating Equipment: Availability of Updated Analysis Results

In this NODA, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) presents its updated analysis used to convert the potential energy conservation standard levels the Department has considered for residential-duty commercial gas-fired storage water heaters from thermal efficiency and standby loss metrics to the uniform energy factor (UEF) metric, as required by a recent change in law. In a notice of proposed rulemaking (NOPR) for energy conservation standards for commercial water heating equipment published on May 30, 2016 (``May 2016 CWH ECS NOPR''), DOE analyzed these potential standard levels for residential-duty commercial gas-fired storage waters in terms of thermal efficiency and standby loss, and converted the levels to UEF using conversion factors that were proposed in a separate NOPR published on April 15, 2015 (``April 2015 conversion factor NOPR''). However, DOE subsequently published a supplemental NOPR (``August 2016 conversion factor SNOPR'') in the conversion factor rulemaking in response to new data on August 30, 2016, and recently issued a conversion factor final rule (``December 6, 2016 conversion factor final rule'') based upon the August 2016 conversion factor SNOPR, which finalized updated conversion factor equations. (See Docket EERE-2015-BT-TP-0007). This NODA presents the thermal efficiency and standby loss levels analyzed in the May 2016 CWH ECS NOPR for residential-duty gas-fired storage water heaters in terms of UEF, using the recently updated conversion factors adopted in the December 6, 2016 conversion factor final rule.