EPS Improvement Act of 2016

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mrs. ELLMERS of North Carolina. I thank the chairman for yielding on this specific issue and for leading our subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my colleagues to support H.R. 4444, the EPS Improvement Act of 2016. This bipartisan bill would provide certainty to North Carolina lighting manufacturers that provide over 3,000 jobs in my home State. H.R. 4444 will resolve the underlying issues of the Department of Energy External Power Supply rule.

In 2005, Congress directed the Department of Energy to develop energy efficiency standards for external power supplies. The DOE initially stated that products intended to be covered by these standards ``convert household electric current into DC or lower voltage AC to operate consumer products such as a laptop computer or a smartphone.''

Years after the passage of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, new technologies such as OLED and LED drivers were introduced into the marketplace. While the development of these drivers increased energy efficiency, it has also caused uncertainty in the manufacturing sector. This is because DOE roped in drivers as products to also be covered under the EPS rule.

DOE is now attempting to regulate a product that was not in the marketplace at the time Congress initially directed the Department to set external power supply standards. Both manufacturers and the energy efficiency community agree that this was and is not the intent of Congress.

DOE has continued with this misguided rule despite the distinct difference in the design and use of LED drivers to that of the design and use of EPS. One example demonstrating the difference is that EPS uses single-stage power conversion while LED drivers use a two-stage power conversion.

Thankfully, H.R. 4444 is a promanufacturing, proconsumer piece of legislation that resolves this problem. It will exclude certain technologies from being included in other broad rulemakings.

I would like to thank my colleagues, Representatives DeGette, Pompeo, Matsui, and Dent for their leadership on this important issue.

Additionally, I would like to thank Chairman Whitfield and the Energy and Power Subcommittee staff for their time and efforts in advancing this legislation.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source