What can I say? Dave Barry collects news stories about exploding cows. I collect stories about toilet smuggling. Thus, Radley Balko in Capitalism Magazine drew my attention with Department of Everything:
In 1992, Congress passed the Energy Policy Act, a big, honking piece of legislation that sought to codify into federal law the thousands of administrative laws put forth by the Department of Energy. It set crucial, national-security-affecting policies such as how cold refrigerators were permitted to be.Psst! Hey buddy, want to buy a toilet?
Also included in that massive bill was a tiny, barely-noticed-at-the-time provision mandating that every toilet sold in the United States after the year 1994 use no more than 1.6 gallons of water per flush. That provision quickly became known in toilet industry circles (yes, there are toilet industry circles) as the "flush twice rule," as patriotic, beef-eating Americans who bought domestic toilets after 1994 had no choice but to flush twice to be sure all their business washed away before houseguests arrived. It also created - I'm not kidding - a "black market" for Canadian toilets - toilets with big, glorious, gluttonous bowls, capable of holding 3, 3 ½, even four gallons of water.
I bring this up because the Department of Energy turns 25 years old this week. And despite an annual budget of $18 billion, 20,000 full-time employees, and 150,000 contract employees, smaller toilet bowls are probably the most memorable thing that's come out of the DOE that's had a significant impact on your life. And I'd venture to guess that most of us don't see smaller toilet bowls as a positive.
Which reminds me of Black-Market Flush:
Recently, on inspection of a 1993-built home being sold by a retiree of the local water company, I was informed that the installed "toilets were going to be replaced due to sentimental value". The 'new' toilets were sitting in the garage.Hey come on! They probably bring back fond memories of many a "porcelain cruise".
Toilets. Sentimental value. Who's zooming whom?
It was obvious that the stools in the garage were the ones originally installed when the house was built. The 'sentimental' units were marked 3.5 gpf (gallons per flush).
