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. 

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.

EU Officials bump up energy efficiency for domestic appliances but cave in to industry pressure on energy labels

[Brussels, 1 April 2009] - European environmental NGOs (EEB, Inforse-Europe, Friends of the Earth Europe, Natuur en Milieu and ECOS) welcome this week’s vote by Member States on energy efficiency measures under the Ecodesign of Energy-Using Products (EuP) Directive [1] but fear the level of ambition is insufficient in a time of climate crisis. In addition, EU officials have rushed through a rather confusing revision of the format for the Energy Label for household appliances which will now corrupt the simple A-G system that is currently in place and widely recognised throughout Europe. [2]

The votes on fridges [3], televisions [4] and washing machines will force manufacturers to produce more energy efficient appliances that have the potential to cut CO2 emissions by about 20 Million tonnes (Mt) per year by 2020 (like taking up to 10 million cars off the road each year). However, consumers would have saved even more on their energy bills if the adopted measures had reached their full potential of 30 Mt of CO2 savings. In addition, EU officials caved in to industry pressure and avoided rescaling the famous A-G Energy Label, instead choosing a new system that runs the risk of misleading consumers and has not been tested.

Edouard Toulouse, Ecodesign Officer at environmental group ECOS said: "An ambitious Ecodesign policy and a crystal-clear Energy Label for consumers are vital tools to make our lives sustainable and bring CO2 emissions down in the most cost-effective way." He added: "Televisions and fridges were very iconic tests for these policies. We expected bolder ambition." NGOs are also worried that the two products to come next under these policies - boilers and water heaters, with enormous CO2-cut potential and the same level of emissions as the transport sector - may not deliver enough [5].

Nathalie Cliquot, Product Policy Officer at the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) added: "Industry pressure prevented EU decision-makers from going for the greenest options and ensuring energy inefficient products are clearly flagged with simple A-G labels." She continued: "At least there will be a serious review of these instruments in 3 to 4 years, but in the meantime we must continue to explain why these policies are so important through the ‘coolproducts’ NGO campaign." [6]

Contacts:

Nathalie Cliquot, Product policy officer at the European Environmental Bureau (EEB)
, +32 (0)2 289 10 97 (French, English)

Edouard Toulouse, Ecodesign officer at ECOS (coordinating the input of Environmental NGOs in these policies)
, +32 (0)2 289 1096 (French, English)

Gunnar Boye Olesen, INFORSE-Europe
, +45 86 22 70 00 (Danish, English)

Notes for Editors:

[1] The EuP and Energy Labelling directives aim at setting minimum environmental performance and consumer information requirements on products sold in the EU. The EU aims to become 20% more energy efficient by 2020. Ambitious eco-design rules have the potential to cut Europe’s CO2 emissions by 450 million tons per year by 2020 - equivalent to the emissions of all European cars.

[2] The EU has revised the well known A-G energy label layout and introduced it for new product categories. Energy Labelling has been one of the most visible and successful EU-wide tools to inform consumers and achieve energy efficiency. However, the current revision adds confusing new classes named "A-20%", "A-40%", instead of rescaling the label to reflect how products have meanwhile become more efficient, so that the "A" grade remains the top of the class.

[3] Fridges and freezers. Despite technological progress in the past, substantial energy savings are still achievable. Also, the growth in appliance size and stock has annihilated part of the previous gains. The current electricity consumption of the domestic fridges and freezers stock on the market is 100TWh.

[4] Televisions: The environmental impact of TVs is an increasing concern. Without very serious policies, the yearly energy consumption of the European stock is expected to increase by 70 TWh in the next 10 years - representing as much as the overall household consumption of Italy. Lack of recyclability and recycling of flat screens is also a serious environmental issue.

[5] For more information on the large potential for energy savings and CO2 emission reductions in the heating products sector, please see this NGO briefing: "EU Ecodesign policy for boilers and water heaters, a huge and underestimated opportunity for climate policy "

[6] A coalition of environmental NGOs launched the "coolproducts" campaign on 12th March 2009. On the day of the launch, partner groups organised a "penguin refugee camp" in front of the European Commission. In addition, Avaaz delivered a petition signed by 116,829 citizens (which has meanwhile increased to 140,000) to the EU Commission asking for more stringent energy efficiency requirements for products sold in the EU.

Experts from EU member states convened last week to decide on the first in the series of votes on energy-efficient and ecologically sound appliances. The first vote was on electric motors. This may sound strange to non-experts, but electric motors are used widely in industry and account for around 70% of the electricity used by that sector. The final decision will lead to annual use-phase electricity consumption savings of about 135 TWh by 2020, corresponding to an annual reduction of 63 Mt of CO2 emissions. These savings correspond to about the annual electricity consumption of Sweden. Coolproducts welcomes this key decision, but also thinks the measure could have been even more ambitious - as industry has managed to achieve several delays for small motors and other additional exemptions.

Some member states, including the UK, also thought there could have been more ambition. Lord Hunt, UK Minister for Sustainability said: "Given the importance of tackling Climate Change, in the UK we were keen to go further, faster and it is disappointing that other countries did not agree with us on this. The European motor market is lagging behind the rest of the world."

Meanwhile, the vote on fridges was postponed because of a lack of agreement on the energy labeling revision (we wrote about this in our earlier blog post silly numbers).

This will have disappointed climate activists from environmental groups BUND, SNM and Milieudefensie who had dressed up as penguins last Thursday and camped in front of the European Commission in Brussels.

Avaaz also joined the penguin camp to present decision makers with the 125,000-strong petition for coolproducts (you can see a short video here). This was presented to Gerard Legris, the European Commission's head of unit Transparency and Relations with Stakeholders, who attended the event on behalf of the President ot the Commission Jose Manuel Barroso. The petition has also been presented to the Czech Presidency of the European Union.

There was a lot of media at the penguin camp, as well as a lot of interest from passers-by, and the penguins made it to "photo of the day" in the online version of the Wall Street Journal and on San Francisco Chronicle. Environmental group SNM was also interviewed on prime time TV in the Netherlands. There was also coverage on NRC.next and Financieel Dagblad, as well as Spanish and even Korean news agencies. A useful and detailed article on this appeared on the Euractiv news site.

As Coolproducts launches, we hear from Friends of the Earth and the Netherlands Society for Nature and Environment that a group of "penguins" will set up on Thursday 12th November a penguin refugee camp made of refrigerators just outside the European Commission's Berlaymont Building, in Brussels. A mass petition signed by European citizens will also be delivered to EU negotiators by Avaaz.org.

Environmental organisations are urging Europe not to agree weak energy efficiency measures and confusing changes to energy labels for key appliances this week. Experts from European Union member states will vote on ‘green’ standards for household appliances like televisions and fridges and how to update or introduce new energy labelling of these products. Environmental groups call on European decision-makers to stop caving in to industry pressure and strengthen the proposals so that Europe can meet its environmental and climate change targets.

The EU aims to become 20% more energy efficient by 2020. According to the Netherlands Society for Nature and Environment and Friends of the Earth Europe, ambitious eco-design rules have the potential to cut Europe’s CO2 emissions by 450 million tons per year by 2020 - equivalent to the emissions of all European cars!

Increased efficiency of products to be voted on this month, including electric motors (11 March), fridges (13 March), televisions (17 March), dishwashers (30 March) and washing machines (31 March) could account for a 100 million ton CO2 saving annually.

Find out more from Friends of the Earth Europe

The year 2009 started with a big controversy in the British media about… lightbulbs. And as Europe prepares for a big round of votes this month on requirements and labels for a variety of products, we can expect more debate. But is the media doing its best in helping readers understand the facts, or does it sometimes contribute to creating unnecessary confusion? Are policy makers looking for yet more excuses to delay the fight against climate change?
More precisely, the controversy in January was about the UK government and EU plans to phase out inefficient incandescent lightbulbs as part of eco-design legislation and to fight climate change. The Daily Mail initiated the whole controversy with a front page story about ‘panic buyers’ in the UK making a mad rush for the last incandescent lightbulbs. Consumers, it is said, will soon be ‘robbed of their right’ to those traditional bulbs.

In our view (and that of many experts), this was all a bit sensationalist and in many ways inaccurate. But things got really interesting when The Sun newspaper criticised its competitor for getting its facts wrong and later responded by giving away not one but three super–efficient Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs (CFLs) for each reader. Then The Guardian tried to help their readers understand the debate by going back to basic facts – albeit only after having allowed writers on its ‘Comment is Free’ section to go as far as invoking Stalin’s work camps and genocide when talking about CFLs (hmm…seriously?). Then it all went quiet again.
Until, that is, The Guardian noticed that another controversy was brewing – over A–G energy efficiency labels (more about this in the next blog entry). Who would have guessed that this could become a controversial issue? Well, it now is.