Wanderport Corp (WDRP)

[TONY64]

Water heater facts from the Department of Energy.
ENERGY STAR® Residential Water Heaters:
Draft Criteria Analysis
Water heating represents between thirteen and seventeen percent of national residential energy
consumption, making it the third largest energy end use in homes, behind heating and cooling and
kitchen appliances. As homes become more energy efficient, the percentage of energy used for water
heating steadily increases. This is attributed to limited energy efficiency potential in the common
conventional water heating technologies as well as ineffective deployment of advanced water heating
technologies. Water heating is the only major residential energy end use that ENERGY STAR does
not address.
Developing ENERGY STAR criteria is critical to expand the value of the ENERGY STAR brand and
its continued relevance in the marketplace. When developing ENERGY STAR criteria, the
Department of Energy considers and balances a varied set of objectives, ensuring that the established
criteria:
• Provide meaningful differentiation between ENERGY STAR qualified products and those that just
meet the Federal standard.
• Will result in significant energy savings, both for consumers and the nation as a whole.
• Are cost-effective for consumers as well as manufacturers.
• Provide ample consumer choice, both in terms of number of models and a wide range of
manufacturers.
• Do not compromise functionality or performance of the qualified product.
• Do not rely on proprietary technologies of one or a small set of manufacturers.
Almost all water heaters sold in the U.S. are traditional storage units with nearly an even split between
gas and electric. Of the 9.8 million water heater shipments in the U.S. in 2006, 4.8 million were
conventional electric-resistance and 4.7 million were conventional gas storage. Advanced water
heating technologies constitute a very small portion of the market. Of the advanced technologies, gas
tankless water heaters have the largest number of shipments at 254,600 in 2006, which represents 2.6%
of the market. Small manufacturers with limited production capacity are the predominant producers of
solar and heat pump water heaters. Solar water heater shipments amount to an estimated 2,430 units
per year, while heat pump water heater shipments amount to less than an estimated 2,000 units per
year. Currently, gas-condensing and advanced non-condensing water heaters are not in the residential
market.
Historically, a number of barriers have prevented widespread success of advanced water heating
technologies, with most of them related to one another. The most significant barrier is the nature of
water heater replacement. Two-thirds of consumers replace their water heaters due to sudden failure of
their existing model. Of those replacements, 60% are emergency replacements.1 When a water heater
fails suddenly, most consumers have their water heater replaced with the cheapest, most readily
available and easily installed model from their plumber or contractor. These circumstances do not
encourage consumers to make the extra effort to track down hard-to-find advanced technologies or
evaluate lifetime cost savings.
1 KEMA