Energy Star requirements?

Here's the timeline from a letter written by Energy Star's Richard Karney:

ENERGY STAR Criteria for Residential Water Heaters
March 2007: Release Draft Criteria
March – May 2007: Comment Period on Draft Criteria
May 2007: Stakeholder Meeting
July 2007: Release Revised Criteria
July – October 2007: Comment Period on Revised Criteria
December 2007: Release Final Criteria
September 2008: Criteria go into effect

So this all got announced finally and GE is stepping up to the plate. They announced two new models that will be compliant with the new EnergyStar criteria for water heaters.

The first is a Hybrid-Electric model (not available until Q4/2009) which claims to leverage heat from ambient air more efficiently to heat the water more efficiently. Seems like a lesser version of what solar water heaters are for. Maybe they could hook it up to their clothes dryers to get some really warm ambient air around it. Anyway, they claim that it's TWICE as efficient as standard electric water heaters.

They also stepped up with a new Tankless model available in May of 2008, but it doesn't seem revolutionary relative to other tankless models out there. Regardless, as a pragmatist I'm always up for the huge companies with massive distribution stepping up to the plate.

Here is a link with information on the 2009 tax rebates...

Appears it may only be on new tankless water heaters?

http://www.dsireusa.org/library/includes/incentive2.cfm?Incentive_Code=US43F&State=federal&currentpageid=1&ee=1&re=1

Dandy Dan

Thanks for the link!  DSIRE is a really great database.