Jimbo
Plumber
The price of a residential gas water heater will increase by at least 50% on Jan. 1, 2008, in the South Coast Air Quality Management District ( LA, Orange, Riverside, and San Bernadino Counties). We have for several years had a LoNox requirement on all WH and gas furnaces in CA. Now, those counties require WH to be ULTRA low nox. I had a chance to see the burner assembly Rheem is using. Looks like the flux capacitor out of a certain Delorean, and cost them a bundle to produce. As happened with the FVIR thing, Rheem has come up with a design which will NOT be a maintenenance and reliability headache, and she predicted that the A.O. Smith design will be troublesome.
The law as written caused some headaches for the supply chain. There is no grandfather for existing inventory. Non-spec units cannot be sold OR INSTALLED after Jan. 1. Rheem is shipping the new ones, expect delivery mid Dec. Suppliers have been letting their inventories run down, because any units left at the end of the month will have to be transferred to Northern CA, or down here to San Diego County, which is not part of the SCAQMD.
The law as written caused some headaches for the supply chain. There is no grandfather for existing inventory. Non-spec units cannot be sold OR INSTALLED after Jan. 1. Rheem is shipping the new ones, expect delivery mid Dec. Suppliers have been letting their inventories run down, because any units left at the end of the month will have to be transferred to Northern CA, or down here to San Diego County, which is not part of the SCAQMD.
