RIA-i

REGULATORY IMPACT ANALYSIS FOR PROPOSED ENERGY CONSERVATION 

STANDARDS FOR BATTERY CHARGERS AND EXTERNAL POWER SUPPLIES 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

RIA.1 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... RIA-1

RIA.2 METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................................... RIA-1

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REGULATORY IMPACT ANALYSIS FOR PROPOSED ENERGY CONSERVATION 

STANDARDS FOR BATTERY CHARGERS AND EXTERNAL POWER SUPPLIES 

RIA.1 INTRODUCTION 

Under the Process Rule (Procedures for Consideration of New or Revised Energy 

Conservation Standards for Consumer Products, 61 FR 36974 (July 15, 1996)), the U.S. Department 

of Energy (DOE) is committed to continually explore non-regulatory alternatives to standards. DOE 

will prepare a draft regulatory impact analysis pursuant to E.O. 12866, “Regulatory Planning and 

Review,” which will be subject to review under the Executive Order by the Office of Management 

and Budget’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. 58 FR 51735. DOE has identified seven 

major alternatives to standards as representing feasible policy options to reduce consumer product 

energy consumption. It will evaluate each alternative in terms of its ability to achieve significant 

energy savings at a reasonable cost, and will compare the effectiveness of each one to the 

effectiveness of the proposed standards rule. 

DOE proposes to analyze the following non-regulatory means of achieving energy savings: 

No new regulatory action 

Consumer tax credits 

Manufacturer tax credits 

Performance standards 

Rebates 

Voluntary energy efficiency targets 

Early replacement 

Bulk government purchases 

The technical support document (TSD) in support of DOE’s notice of proposed rulemaking 

will include a complete quantitative analysis of each alternative, the methodology for which is 

discussed briefly below. 

RIA.2 METHODOLOGY 

DOE will use the national impact analysis (NIA) spreadsheet models for each of the two 

products to calculate the national energy savings and the net present value (NPV) corresponding 

to each alternative to the proposed standards. The NIA model for battery chargers (BCs) and 

external power supplies (EPSs) is discussed in chapter 10 of the TSD. To compare each 

alternative quantitatively to the proposed energy conservation standards, DOE will need to 

quantify the effect of each alternative on the purchase and use of energy-efficient BCs and EPSs. 

Once it has quantified each alternative, DOE will make the appropriate revisions to the inputs in 

the NIA models. Key inputs that DOE may revise in these models are: 

• Energy prices and escalation factors; 

• Implicit market discount rates for trading off purchase price against operating 

expense when choosing equipment efficiency; 

• Consumer purchase price, operating cost, and income elasticities; 

• Consumer price-versus-efficiency relationships; and 

• Product stock data (purchase of new product or turnover rates for inventories). 

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The key measures of the impact of each alternative will be: 

• Energy use (in quadrillion Btu): Cumulative energy use of the products sold from the 

effective date of the new standard, 2013, until products sold in 2042 are retired from 

use. DOE will report electricity consumption as primary (source) energy. 

• National energy savings: Cumulative national energy use from the base case 

projection minus the alternative policy case projection. 

• Net present value: The value of future operating cost savings from products bought in 

the period from 2013 to 2042. DOE will calculate the NPV as the difference between 

the present value of product and operating expenditures (including energy) in the base 

case, and the present value of expenditures in each alternative policy case. DOE will 

discount future operating and product expenditures to 2010 using a seven-percent and 

three-percent real discount rate. It will calculate operating expenses (including energy 

costs) for the life of the products. 

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