Department of Energy August 2020 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) invites public comment on its Request for Information (RFI) number DE-FOA-0002386 to help inform its Bioenergy Technologies Office's (BETO) research priorities and funding strategies. The purpose of this RFI is to solicit feedback from industry, academia, research laboratories, government agencies, and other stakeholders on issues related to residential wood heater technology advancement and bioprocessing separations development.

Roctop Investments Inc. (Applicant or Roctop) has applied for renewal of its authorization to transmit electric energy from the United States to Canada pursuant to the Federal Power Act (FPA).

The Department of Energy is amending its decision-making process for selecting energy conservation standards by specifying that it will conduct a comparative analysis of the relative benefits and burdens of potential energy conservation standard levels in determining whether a specific energy conservation standard level is economically justified.

In compliance with the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (Commission or FERC) is soliciting public comment on a renewal of currently approved information collection, FERC-523 (Application for Authorization for the Issuance of Securities or the Assumption of Liabilities).

On August 9, 2019, as a result of a petition from the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers (AHAM) and data received in response to that petition, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) published a notice of proposed rulemaking (NOPR) proposing to withdraw the test procedure for conventional cooking tops established under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA). In this final rule, DOE withdraws the test procedure for conventional cooking tops under EPCA. DOE has determined that the conventional cooking tops test procedure is not representative of energy use or efficiency during an average use cycle and is overly burdensome to conduct.

This notice announces a meeting of the Advanced Scientific Computing Advisory Committee (ASCAC). Federal Advisory Committee Act requires that public notice of these meetings be announced in the Federal Register.

The Department of Energy (``DOE'') announces a meeting via webinar of the Appliance Standards and Rulemaking Federal Advisory Committee (ASRAC). The Federal Advisory Committee Act requires that agencies publish notice of an advisory committee meeting in the Federal Register.

The U.S. Department of Energy (``DOE'') proposes to amend the existing test procedure for showerheads to revise the definition of a showerhead consistent with the most recent standard developed by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (``ASME'') in 2018. DOE's current definition considers all of the individual showerheads (which DOE has termed variously as sprays, openings, or nozzles) in a product containing multiple showerheads together for purposes of compliance with the water conservation standard established in the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (``EPCA''). DOE proposes instead to define showerhead as that term is defined in the 2018 ASME standard, such that each showerhead in a product containing multiple showerheads would be considered separately for purposes of determining standards compliance, and only one of them would need to be turned on for testing. DOE has determined that the proposed definition is consistent with EPCA and, unlike the current definition, compliant with Office of Management and Budget (``OMB'') Circular A-119. In addition, the proposed definition is consistent with DOE's treatment of other products, such as body sprays. DOE also proposes to define the terms ``body spray'' and ``safety shower showerhead'' to clarify which products are not subject to the current energy conservation standard. DOE invites comment on all aspects of this proposal, and announces a public webinar to collect comments and data on its proposal.