How your showerhead and fridge got roped into the culture wars todayheadline

Efficiency standards for home appliances were once the conversational equivalent of beige — neutral, but aggressively uninteresting. But as political polarization has deepened, dishwashers, laundry machines, showerheads, and other household staples have begun to take on a new charge. With Republicans now in control of the White House and both houses of Congress, rules that quietly save Americans money on utility bills while conserving energy and water are suddenly at risk.

Earlier this month, President Donald Trump doubled down on his long-standing complaint about low-flow showerheads taking too long to clean his “beautiful hair.” He ordered his administration to repeal a rule, revived by the Biden administration, that aimed to save water by restricting flow from the fixtures. A White House fact sheet promised the order would undo “the left’s war on water pressure” and “make America’s showers great again.”

It’s part of a growing movement targeting efficiency standards — last year, House Republicans passed bills including the “Refrigerator Freedom Act” and “Liberty in Laundry Act,” though neither succeeded in the Democratic-led Senate. Now in charge of both houses of Congress, Republicans have already passed a resolution to repeal a recent energy-efficiency standard for gas-powered tankless water heaters, which awaits Trump’s signature. 

Efficiency standards used to have bipartisan support. But today, many Republican politicians see restrictions on gas stoves, refrigerators, and laundry machines as symbols of Democratic interference with people’s self-determination. That’s the idea Trump advanced when he signed an executive order targeting efficiency standards for home goods and appliances “to safeguard the American people’s freedom to choose.” The message echoes talking points from industry groups that have an interest in keeping homes hooked up to natural gas for stoves and water heaters.

“This isn’t the first time that we’ve seen efficiency standards thrust into the culture wars,” said Andrew deLaski, the executive director of the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, which advocates for stricter energy-efficiency legislation. “But President Trump has put that into overdrive.”

The push for more efficient appliances began in response to the fuel shortages sparked by the 1973 oil crisis. Republican president Gerald Ford signed the bipartisan Energy Policy and Conservation Act in 1975, laying the groundwork for the government to set standards on household appliances. But state laws for more efficient appliances came first, forcing manufacturers to navigate a patchwork of rules. So Congress set nationwide efficiency standards for water heaters, air conditioners, dishwashers, and many other household appliances with the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act in 1987, signed by another Republican president — Ronald Reagan. 

Congress continued to expand those standards with bipartisan support in 1992, 2005, and 2007. In total, the Department of Energy now oversees standards for about 60 categories of appliances and other equipment in homes and businesses, spanning from toilets to commercial refrigerators.

In January, the pre-Trump Department of Energy estimated that these rules, taken together, saved the average U.S. household about $576 a year on their bills. They also cut national energy use by 6.5 percent and water consumption by 12 percent, making them a key tool for addressing climate change and drought. Voters are broadly supportive of energy-saving policies, with 87 percent of Americans polled by Consumer Reports in March agreeing that new home appliances should be required to meet a minimum level of efficiency — including 82 percent of Republicans. “People aren’t clamoring for products that needlessly waste energy and money,” deLaski said.

Despite efficiency’s broad popularity, there have been flare-ups of pushback and public outrage against efficient appliances dating back to the 1980s. Reagan actually vetoed the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act, saying it restricted “the freedom of choice available to consumers who would be denied the opportunity to purchase low-cost appliances,” the year before he signed it. In a 1996 episode of Seinfeld, Jerry, Kramer, and Newman were so fed up with the new low-flow showerheads in their building, they resorted to buying black-market Yugoslavian models from the back of a truck. Another culture war brewed over energy-efficient LED light bulbs in the 2010s as older, incandescent models began to be phased out, with Tea Party Republicans declaring that light bulb choice was a matter of personal liberty.

Matthew Burgess, an environmental economist at the University of Wyoming, said that efficiency rules are most likely to become a cultural flashpoint when people see them directly affecting their lives. “People do notice the flow of their showerheads,” he said. “People do notice whether their stove is gas or electric.” Some of the political tension over appliances resulted from ambitious changes, he said, such as when Berkeley, California, tried to ban gas connections in new buildings in 2019.

“I think that there’s an impression on parts of the right, that’s not totally wrong, that elements in the climate community, and on the left, and in certain segments of the Democratic Party want to tell them what to do and what not to do in their households,” Burgess said.

Yet the fossil fuel industry has also influenced the conversation: There’s been a coordinated campaign to highlight the narrative of “consumer choice” for gas appliances in particular, according to Emilia Piziak, a senior analyst at InfluenceMap, a climate think tank. Last year, for instance, the American Gas Association filed a court brief challenging Biden-era Department of Energy efficiency rules on furnaces and water heaters, arguing that Congress “wanted consumers to have the freedom to choose the energy type they prefer.”

“These industry groups and gas utilities, they are working together,” Piziak said. “They’re very effective at showing up and driving that messaging home.” The “freedom to choose” narrative has also been echoed by Trump officials. One of the top priorities of Trump’s energy secretary, Chris Wright, is to “promote affordability and consumer choice in home appliances.”

The Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers told Grist that while it supports the efficiency standards process, it wants changes. “The rulemaking process and analysis should focus more on consumer impact, specifically regarding affordability and product choice,” the association said in a statement. “Any standard that is developed should have real, measurable benefits for the consumer.” 

Though high-efficiency appliances tend to be more expensive up-front, they can save households thousands of dollars on bills over the long term. And deLaski argued that efficiency standards also deliver other benefits to consumers. “Today’s high-efficiency products, whether we’re talking about light bulbs or clothes washers or showerheads, perform as well and in many cases better than the inefficient products that they’ve replaced,” he said.

While the Energy Policy and Conservation Act prevents the government from weakening efficiency standards for appliances that have already been set, deLaski said he’s concerned that the Trump administration is looking for a way around that. “I think all the standards are at risk of being undercut, circumvented, not enforced,” he said. 

Recently, Republicans have been targeting the efficiency rules set in place at the end of the Biden administration. Because of the Congressional Review Act, Congress can review and repeal a regulation issued in the last 60 legislative days — a period that extends back into last summer — with a simple majority vote. So far, Republicans have not only voted to repeal efficiency standards for gas water heaters under this rule, but also commercial refrigeration equipment and walk-in coolers for restaurants, convenience stores, and grocery stores. The efficiency rules passed under the Biden administration alone would save households $107 each year over the next two decades, according to an estimate from the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, and collectively save business owners $2 billion each year.

These recent moves by Republicans show that what started as a battle over “consumer choice” has expanded into a larger attack on efficiency as an objective. “I don’t think walk-in coolers are in the culture war,” deLaski said. “The attempt to push to eliminate these commonsense standards is really broad, not just about showerheads or refrigerators or dishwashers.”