A final agreement was reached last week on two key EU energy efficiency policies: the revision of the energy efficiency legislation for buildings and the revision of the EU A-G energy labelling scheme.

On the energy label, the dispute (which we wrote about here and then here) between the European Parliament and some Member States led by the Swedish Presidency of the EU was resolved with a rather empty compromise. This has left many unhappy although it is arguably a damage limitation exercise from the European Parliament against some seriously aggressive lobbying from white goods manufacturers.
The decision in the end was to continue piling up additional classes on top of the initial well-known A-G scale. Energy classes A+ and A++ had already been introduced for fridges some years ago. Now for all product categories, the label will be opened to A+, A++ and even A+++.
The more reasonable option of "rescaling" existing models - in order to ensure that the A class remains the top reference by becoming increasingly tougher to reach, and that there is a real distinction between different classes – has always been opposed by the white goods industry and has been eventually postponed to the next label revision process, in 2014, despite the fact it would actually have been quite urgent.
This risks making the label ineffective on consumers’ purchase decisions because it means that - in the case of fridges - the most efficient products will be labelled A+++ but the most inefficient products on the market will actually be labelled A, as hardly any product still fall under categories below A, such as B or C (these classes were defined 15 years ago!). This is clearly confusing for consumers.  

The only solution to this problem would have been to adopt an efficiency label that is regularly updated. Unfortunately too many policy makers seem to prefer to listen to the manufacturers' concerns about their fears of not being able to sell their outdated and inefficient products, rather than to consumers, environmental organisations and retailers worried about accurate consumer information and the future of our planet.

A close-ended scale that is regularly updated to reflect technical developments has been opposed by some manufacturers which feared that downgraded products can not be sold anymore.

On top of that, EU decision-makers were not able to agree on a public procurement clause, which would have meant that our governments and cities would have had to buy only energy efficient products. The mandatory mention of the energy rating in product advertising is also not as good as we hoped: it will be displayed only when product advertisements already mention technical data.

You can find a position of a group of environmental and consumer NGOs here (circulated to decision-makers just before their final decision) and a background paper by BUND (in German here. There is also some analysis on the Stop Climate Change website of the Green Party and a Labelling-Directive---for-now" target="_blank">WWF press release.

On buildings, a political agreement on the revision of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (so-called ‘EPBD’) was reached last Wednesday. It still needs to be confirmed December 7th in the Council of Ministers. The new legislation calls for near zero energy buildings, which sounds good, but the agreement reached seems to be far from what environmental campaign groups have been calling for. It's particularly clear that the huge energy savings potential of Europe’s existing buildings has not been tapped into as much as it would have been needed, and that this will have a dramatic impact on the possibility of reaching Europe's energy conservation targets. Two weeks ahead of the start of the Copenhagen summit, this is not great news.

We all know the A-G Energy Label rainbow. From the top, it starts with the A-rated green bar of a highly energy-efficient product, moves through the D-rated yellow bar of medium energy efficiency, and down to the E-rated red bar of energy inefficiency. 

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Claude Turmes, Luxemburgish Member of the European Parliament (MEP) said the appliance producers “may have qualified themselves for next year's 'Worst EU lobbying awards' for their misleading campaign”. But with this vote, “they fortunately failed to secure a system that would continue to grant an A grade efficiency label to virtually all of their products.”

This political deadlock can now only be solved through a negotiation between EU decision-makers, in the framework of the revision of the Directive for Energy Labelling. In the meantime, the European Parliament has managed to block the new label for televisions, but failed to do so with the proposed new label for fridges. Therefore, it is as if the European Parliament had sent two contradictory messages. This unprecedented political situation, due to the nature of these votes and the different numbers of votes required, should not hide the fact that a majority of MEPs has expressed strong doubts about the industry way.

And Environmental NGOs and the Cool Products Campaign insist that this political imbroglio should not delay the adoption of other important energy efficiency measures on products.

You probably wouldn’t show off a new boiler to friends when they come round for dinner. The bulky, might we say rather uninspiring, machine is purely functional. While it provides your home with heat and hot water, no matter how useful it is the boiler just doesn’t hold the same appeal as the latest flat screen TV or the hottest new PC. But boilers have the potential to provide great value to the consumer. In fact an energy efficient boiler could become your prize appliance by single-handedly slashing your energy bills and reducing your household green house gas emissions.

After the March votes by European experts on fridges, televisions, washing machines and the A-G energy labelling system, boilers and water heaters will be up for consideration in the coming months. Once again, there is great potential for significant reductions in both green house gases and household energy bills. In fact these machines that we use to heat our homes and our water contribute 25% of total carbon dioxide emissions in the European Union.

The proposed energy efficiency measures could be much more ambitious. Take for example a medium-sized water heater. The models currently on the market have an average energy efficiency of 35%. That means approximately two thirds of the energy used to run a water heater is lost. More technologically advanced models have efficiency levels of 50%. Unfortunately, the proposed measures require a level of only 36%.

Industry lobbies have exerted pressure and succeeded in weakening the measures that will soon be voted on. To bolster their case for weaker requirements, lobbyists have pointed to reluctant consumers who are apparently loath to pay for more efficient heaters. On the contrary, recent surveys show that Europeans are highly concerned about climate change and believe the European Union can do more to combat it. What is more, as with more efficient TVs and fridges, consumers stand to gain from more energy efficient boilers and water heaters with savings on their utilities bills.