On Jan. 6, the Consortium for Energy Efficiency’s (CEE’s) Board of Directors approved revisions to the CEE Commercial Unitary AC (Air Conditioning) and HP (Heat Pump) Specification.
CEE worked closely with manufacturers and trade associations during the revision process. In updating the specification, it:
• Replaced integrated-part-load-value criteria with integrated-energy-efficiency-ratio (IEER) criteria, providing an improved basis for energy-efficiency-program administrators to claim savings across the full range of equipment operation.
• Aligned Tier 0 with the ENERGY STAR specification for light-commercial air conditioners, creating an opportunity for energy-efficiency-program administrators to leverage the ENERGY STAR brand and marketing platform.
• Provided a high-efficiency tier for variable-refrigerant-flow (VRF) multisplit air conditioners and heat pumps to support members’ need to promote the most efficient unitary equipment across different applications and to differentiate and promote high-efficiency VRF systems.
• Improved the market relevance of the unitary-heat-pump specification by slightly lowering energy-efficiency-ratio requirements to better reflect current levels of efficient cooling performance.
The revised specification provides three tiers of efficiency for unitary air conditioners, two tiers for unitary heat pumps, and one tier for VRF air conditioners and heat pumps.
CEE plans to monitor members’ adoption of the updated specification.
The revised specification is available here.