I dream of a day when news from the Federal Government comes rarely and it regards matters of serious concern.
Dishwasher energy use is a consumer choice matter; not a Federal one.
They have to have energy mandates, because high efficiency is very expensive and generally doesn’t work as well. Few people would choose to spend more money for an item with lower performance, i.e. a dishwasher that doesn’t clean as well, in order to save a dollar or two per month on energy.
Consider the old V8 engine. Some improvements, like headers, produce a fairly good performance increase for the money spent. To get better performance, one has to spend progressively more money for smaller returns. This is the situation, I believe, with green technologies.
I’m not saying I believe in all these government mandates. I have no problem with a government that wants to recommend a particular energy saving feature, but I don’t think it should be mandating them. Regardless, I think I understand why liberals feel they have to create these mandates. It’s the only way to drive the changes liberals want. People with free choice won’t make the “right” choices.