Ceasefire?

It looks like the SawStop battle is over, at least for now. 

It was only a year ago when it seemed a certainty that the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission was about to implement standards and guidelines requiring all new tables saws to include flesh-detecting technology.  

The topic has been debated since the invention of SawStop a quarter century ago, with the CPSC considering if, how, and when to establish those standards going on for two decades. 

But a couple weeks ago, the CPSC announced that they wouldn’t continue with the implementation of the table saw standards (along with standards for a half dozen or so other safety regulations) that were in the works. All were nearly ready to go, literally. Now, they’ve all been scrubbed. 

What happened? Well, for one thing, just last summer the Power Tool Institute and others opposed to implementing SawStop-type safety mechanisms to table saws kicked their opposition into high gear. And, with the CPSC continuing the take input from consumers, members of the public also against the technology had more time to make their voices heard. Then, of course, there’s politics and a change in administrations in Washington. All of these things put together brought it all to a screeching halt. 

So, for the time being, nothing will happen. Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?  I can’t really answer that, but I can guarantee that the debate will continue, even if the CPSC process is currently dead in the water.