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California is the first state that is attempting to pass legislation that would ban the sale of television sets that don’t meet their new efficiency standards.  The proposal of the California Energy Commission is attempting to gain approval over the summer and go into effect as early as January 2011.

The way that the law would work is that there would be a cap placed on how much power a television set uses while in active mode, in lieu of the regulation that now places on a set’s power consumption in standby mode. The standards would go into effect with a two tier system.  The first tier scheduled for January 2011 would have each 0.156 square inches of screen area cap off at 80 watts.  The second tier scheduled for January 2013 would not permit more than 25 watts for each 0.12 square inch.

TV companies, especially plasma set manufacturers, which the law seems to target, have not been pleased by the proposal and feel that Energy Star policies that they have currently been following are more than sufficient.  However, the California Energy Commission thinks that the second tier would bring down energy usage as much as 49 percent and save residents an average of $18 to $30 annually per TV set. 

Read: [Wired]