Florida Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R) is questioning new proposed regulatory standards on ceiling fan manufacturers in Miami. Together with lawmakers from across the country, Salazar directed a letter to Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm to raise awareness of the issue.
Earlier this year, the Department of Energy submitted a proposed rule for comment regarding new energy conservation standards on ceiling fan manufacturers. The proposed rule would decrease the maximum estimated energy consumption that’s permissible for large diameter and belt driven ceiling fans.
Moreover, the rule would require a number of small business fan manufacturers to redesign their products as well as putting between 10 and 30 percent of small business fan manufacturers to redesign their products. This would result in having the same 10 and 30 percent of small business ceiling fan manufacturers out of business.
In response, lawmakers argue that the bureaucratic rule will end up costing and imposing severe hardship on small business owners in Miami. According to a press release from Salazar's office, these businesses are seeing their livelihoods affected by supply chain issues, inflation, and burdensome regulation.
Subsequently, the letter, signed by members of the House Small Business Committee, was directed to Secretary Granholm, and it poses several questions that require an immediate response.
In a statement, Salazar commented that “small businesses in Miami are hurting from the Biden Administration’s cruel and unruly regulatory agenda,” adding that “Biden’s Department of Energy is proposing rules that would put thousands of ceiling fan manufacturers across my District and the country out of business.”
“Make no mistake – Biden’s energy agenda is anti-Miami and anti-America,” she concluded.
“America’s small businesses deserve to have their voices heard and considered,” the lawmakers write in their letter, setting a deadline of “no later than August 30, 2023” for Granholm to address the numerous questions that were outlined in the letter.
