Phony products impress federal Energy Star program

WASHINGTON — Federal investigators who submitted phony products, such as a gasoline-powered alarm clock, to the government's energy-efficiency certification program found it easy to obtain approval and say the program is "vulnerable to fraud and abuse."

Investigators with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said they obtained Energy Star approval for 15 of 20 fictitious products they submitted for certification with fake energy-savings claims. Two were rejected and three did not receive a response.

Two of the certified products received purchase requests by real companies because four bogus firms, developed for the purpose of the investigation, were listed as Energy List partners.

Among the phony products that obtained Energy Star certification was a "room air cleaner" that, in a picture prominently displayed on the Web site of a bogus company, showed an electric space heater with a feather duster and strips of fly paper attached to it.

"Certification controls were ineffective primarily because Energy Star does not verify energy-savings data reported by manufacturers," investigators said in a GAO report released Friday.

Work for the investigation, undertaken at the request of Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, started last June and did not involve products that are already certified and available to the public.

Designed to promote energy-efficient products that are 10 to 25 percent more energy efficient than minimum federal standards, Energy Star claims to have helped U.S. families save nearly $17 billion on their utility bills in 2009 and "enough energy to avoid greenhouse-gas emissions equivalent to those from 30 million cars."

The voluntary labeling program, started in 1992 in response to the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 and the Energy Policy Act of 1992, is heavily promoted through tax credits and appliance rebates. In some cases, federal agencies can only purchase Energy Star certified products.

In a joint statement, the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy, which jointly manage the program, vowed to improve certifying standards. A representative said they had received initial notification of the findings in February.