Proposed rollback of efficiency rules targets home appliances
The deleted webpages were filed under the department’s “energy saver” section and included a broad range of advice on energy and cost-saving measures, including ways to keep homes cool during summer when energy bills and usage can spike and tips on weatherstripping to seal air leaks, according to the Guardian. The removals were identified by researchers at the Internet Archive, a nonprofit that hosts a repository of archived webpages.
The timing of the deletions coincided with two notable events. On July 1, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani asked residents to set their air conditioners to 78 degrees to reduce strain on the city’s electrical grid amid a heatwave. The next day, the Trump administration announced a proposal to weaken energy efficiency standards for home appliances such as air conditioners and heaters. The Guardian reported that 18 of the deleted pages were last live on July 1 and 2, suggesting they were removed around the time of the proposal.
“The strain on our grid is a lot lower than it would be, and people’s utility bills are a lot lower than they would be” because of the efficiency program, said Andrew deLaski, executive director of the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, a coalition of environmental, consumer and utility industry groups. DeLaski said the proposed rollback would “effectively undo decades of policies that have been proven to lower household utility bills” and make it harder for future administrations to update standards.
Itai Vardi, research manager at the Energy and Policy Institute, a nonprofit watchdog focused on fossil fuel and utility issues, called the combination of the rule proposal and website deletions “just absurd.” “It’s ironic that the Trump administration and Republicans love to talk about consumer choice as a tenet of American freedom, but they’re actually taking that away,” Vardi said. “What they’re doing here is rolling back the rules on energy efficiency, but also trying to hide helpful tips and information for the public, and it’s going to cost people more money.”
The Department of Energy did not respond to the Guardian’s questions about when and why the webpages were deleted and whether the removals were related to the proposed rule.
The deletions are part of a broader pattern of information removal from federal websites, according to the Guardian. The Trump administration has also removed data on queer and transgender youth and online resources from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This is not the first attempt to weaken efficiency standards; the department tried to repeal 47 regulations last May and sought to end the Energy Star program, but the effort was blocked by bipartisan congressional opposition earlier this year.