Appliance Design - July 2008 - (Page 10)

NEwS watch REtaIlERS SUED. Sears Roebuck & Co., cERtIFIcatION Home Depot, Loew’s, and HHGregg Inc. were named in a federal lawsuit that claims the retailers ignored fire-hazard warnings by using metal foil and plastic vents when installing dryers. The lawsuit claims that all dryer manufacturers instruct owners to use heavy metal vents when setting up the appliances. Failure to do so could lead to a fire or death, according to the suit. The suit doesn’t link any dryer fires to the retailer installations. In an email response to an Appliance Design inquiry, a Sears spokesman said that as this is pending litigation, the company would have no comment. SaNYO BUYS ShaRP lcDS. Japanbased Sanyo Electric Co. has started purchasing LCD panels from Sharp Corp., also of Japan, for use in its flat panel TVs sold in North America. Sanyo sold about 1 million LCD TVs in North America in the last business year, ending March 31. According to a Reuters report, the two companies are considering jointly developing kitchen appliances. In other news, Sanyo announced improved financial results and said it was in the black for the first time in four years. The company cited increased sales of rechargeable batteries and digital cameras for the improvement. In addition, the company says profits will jump this year on the sale of its cell phone unit, according to the Reuters report. PROGRaM. The Universal Powerline Association (UPA), an industry consortium providing a forum for the design and development of interoperable and open specifications for powerline communications, has launched the UPA Powerline Interop 2008 Certification program. The program, which kicked off with a two-day plugtest and certification event held on June 25-26, was created to support the commercial deployment of the UPA’s 200 Mbps Powerline communication technology and to ensure interoperability between current and future Powerline products from different vendors. Specifically, the UPA is working to support the IEEE P1901 and ITU-T G.hn standards under development. The former focuses exclusively on Powerline networking and the latter adds coaxial and phone line networking to ensure that Powerline technology will have complete interoperability within a final standard. plug-and-play platform for interchangeable consumer electronics devices. The station can charge cell phones, MP3 players and more than 2,700 other devices by changing a iGo tip that fits that product. GRIllING YEaR ROUND. BBQ grilling The worldwide external power supply (EPS) market is projected to grow from $6.7 billion in 2008 to almost $10 billion in 2013, according to a new report from the Darnell Group. In terms of units sold, the EPS market is expected to grow at a somewhat faster pace, increasing from 2.0 billion units in 2008 to 3.3 billion units in 2013. Although this market is mature, and a number of segments have slowed, the industry as a whole is still strong and expanding, the report says. The report breaks down the worldwide market into three regions, North America, Europe and Asia, and projects steady growth for the external AC-DC power supply market over the forecast period in each of those regions. EXtERNal POwER DEMaND. is no longer just a summertime activity as an increasing number of Americans fire up their grills year round, according to The NPD Group, a market research company. NPD’s 22nd annual Eating Patterns in America report shows that outdoor grill usage in the U.S. is at an all-time high; nearly double what it was 20 years ago. In 1985, 17 percent of households used a grill to cook dinner at least once during an average two-week period throughout the year; in 2007, it was 38 percent. Summer still accounts for the highest consumption levels of grilled food, however. The majority of households have an outdoor grill (76 percent) and the gas grills are most often purchased. The study reports that 75 percent of grill owners have a gas grill. In 2007, NPD estimates that overall unit sales of grills grew by 3.2 percent as compared to 2006. GREEN hOME ScORES. Energy- and water-saving appliances from Whirlpool and KitchenAid and electronic items from Panasonic helped National Homebuilder Mainstream GreenHome achieve a historically low score in the Home Efficiency Rating System (HERS) from Energy Star. The Mainstream GreenHome, located in Raleigh, N.C., was built to show that sustainable construction is compatible with conventional building and design practices. Appliances in the home included the KitchenAid Architect Series II Built-In Refrigerator and a KitchenAid brand Energy Star qualified dishwasher. The home also featured the Whirlpool Duet HT model clothes washer and Panasonic’s WhisperGreen Premium series fans. The fans include built-in speed and timer controls and DC motors. Panasonic flat-screen TVs, including two high performance plasma display TVs, are Energy Star certified and are the only models available from any manufacturer in the world to feature a completely lead-free display. DIGItal DIVIDE. Roughly one-fifth of IGO GEtS cONNEctED. Whirlpool Corp., Benton Harbor, Mich., has added a recharging station for its centralpark Connection refrigerator. The iGo from Mobility Electronics, Scottsdale, Ariz., is a all U.S. heads-of-household have never used e-mail, according to the National Technology Scan, a study from Parks Associates. This annual phone survey of U.S. households found 20 million homes are without Internet access, which represents approximately 18 percent of all U.S. households. In addition, nearly one out of three heads-of-households have never used a computer to create a document. John Barrett, director of research for Parks Associates, says, “The data underscores the significant digital divide between the connected majority and the unconnected minority that rarely, if ever, uses a computer.” Age and education are factors in this divide as about 50 percent of those who have never used e-mail are older than 65, and 56 percent 10 applianceDESIGN July 2008 www.applianceDESIGN.com http://G.hn http://www.appliancedesign.com

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Appliance Design - July 2008 Contents Editorial Shipments/Forecasts News Watch Heating Elements Gas Technology Motors & Pumps Controls & Sensors Design Marts Association Report: AHAM Advertiser's Index

Appliance Design - July 2008

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