RICH PEDRONCELLI / Associated Press
Doug Pongrazc checks out televisions while shopping at a Best Buy in California, where state regulators are restricting energy-hungry flat-screen TVs.
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Power-hungry TVs will be banned from store shelves in California after state regulators yesterday adopted a first-in-the-nation mandate to reduce electricity demand.
In a unanimous vote, the California Energy Commission required all new televisions up to 58 inches to be more energy-efficient, beginning in 2011. The standard will toughen in 2013 - with only a quarter of all TVs now on the market at that level.
The commission estimated that TVs account for about 10 percent of a home's electricity use. The commission's concern is that the energy draw will rise as much as 8 percent a year as consumers buy larger televisions, add more of them to their homes, and watch them longer.
Commissioners said energy-efficiency standards were the cheapest and easiest way to save electricity.
Energy Commissioner Julia Levin said the new rule would "save consumers money, it will help protect public health, and it will spark innovation."
Each energy-efficient TV would save a household roughly $30 a year in lowered electricity costs. If all 35 million TVs in the state were replaced with more efficient sets, Californians would save $8.1 billion over 10 years, according to the Energy Commission report.
TVs larger than 58 inches, which account for no more than 3 percent of the market, would not be covered by the rule, a concession to independent retailers that sell high-end home-theater TVs. The commission is expected to regulate them in the future.
Environmental groups supported the tougher standards and hoped they would prompt manufacturers to make new energy-efficient models for the rest of the nation. They said the rules would cut California's power bill about $1 billion a year, avoiding the need to build a 500-megawatt power plant.
Some manufacturers, though, said the new power standard would limit consumer choice and harm California retailers because consumers could simply buy TVs out of state or online.
Industry representatives also have said the standards will force manufacturers to make televisions with poorer picture quality and fewer features than those sold elsewhere in the United States.
The new rule, for example, requires all new 42-inch television sets to use fewer than 183 watts by 2011 and fewer than 116 watts by 2013. By comparison, a 42-inch Hitachi plasma TV sold in 2007 uses 313 watts.
