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The global COVID-19 pandemic has brought far-reaching changes for our society. Suddenly, millions of people spent the majority of their time at home - either due to a lock down or by switching from office to working remotely. This paper offers a literature review regarding pandemic-related behavioural changes and a first mapping of likely consequences for EU Ecodesign regulations. These impacts are considered for product groups that are already regulated by EU Ecodesign or are under discussion for future regulation. Furthermore, potential for smart home applications are analysed exemplarily. We identified which behavioural changes have the potential to become established in the long-term. This might need to result in adaptions for regulations under the Ecodesign Directive and EU-Energy Labelling regulations to better reflect the recently appeared usage profiles. It might require different priority settings regarding the product groups to be regulated and communicated to users, due to online shopping proliferation, to be updated. Changed behaviour can be observed in product groups such as ICT, consumer electronics and household appliances. Examples include the increased use of laptops and tablets for digital teaching, use of gaming devices and office equipment in private households (IT, printing and network devices) and changed cooking behaviour. This resulted in increased sales of some product types. Online sales became even more important than in-store sales, which also means that consumers are increasingly informed online about energy efficiency. More do-it-yourself (DIY) home projects result in more frequent - not yet regulated - DIY power tool use and over the long run might stimulate the need for (semi-)professional tools. The changes in behaviour patterns also offer the opportunity to optimize consumption by means of smart homes and smart products. However, the control of networked household appliances requires additional energy for standby states and data exchange. As an illustrative example, we discuss the conflict between higher energy consumption for smart system components and the possible optimization of consumption in private households.
Several models of range hoods were tested by independent and accredited testing institutes. The results have been compared to the information declared by the manufacturer on the energy efficiency label and the product fiche. The measured electric power input of the lighting System and the measured grease absorption factor often differed significantly from the declared values.
The reasons for these observations and the necessary steps to ensure accurate measurements and a meaningful EU energy efficiency label are elucidated. It is suggested that the ranges of the lighting efficiency classes are readjusted to fit the nowadays prevalent LED technology.
Furthermore the tolerance in the regulation for the nominal electric power input of the lighting could be extended by a minimum absolute tolerance. The grease absorption test method may need a rework to achieve a satisfying accuracy.
Resource efficiency is a much discussed topic in terms of improving the sustainability of energy related and energy non-related products. Resource efficiency aspects such as the availability of spare parts, the ability to dismantle, etc. have been included in draft working documents in the revision of several already existing Ecodesign regulations as a first step. However, often these aspects are not consistent with the current technology and design of these products. A possible reason could be a lack of sufficient consultation or of a methodology which is sufficiently tailored for this topic. The established strategies and tools, used by policymakers, such as the Methodology for the Ecodesign of Energy-related Products (MEErP), do not seem to deal with these aspects appropriately. Draft requirements need to be very well developed before being discussed with member states and other related stakeholders, because including resource efficiency parameters could lead to additional, very wide-ranging effects on society. This topic cannot be covered well with legislative tools developed primarily for energy aspects. In this paper, a method is presented which can be used to combine products’ properties with crucial resource efficiency indicators. The method can be used to develop a set of draft legislative requirements and to pre-evaluate these requirements by target groups which would be affected by additional legal requirements. These include: market surveillance authorities, standardization organizations, manufacturers and their associations, environmental organizations and research facilities. The method incorporates stakeholders’ feedback to identify potential resource efficiency measures for materials and/or products, their impact on the European ecology, economy and society. Based on this it would help to develop legislative requirements which are feasible and desirable. The results can then be fed into the formal legislative process, probably speeding it up.
Energy efficient products often have a higher purchase price than less efficient alternatives. However, the life cycle costs are often lower due to the lower operating costs. From a purely economic point of view, efficient appliances are not only more ecological but often also more economical and, accordingly, should be purchased more frequently than less efficient appliances. However, this is not always the case. Information deficits are one of the major reasons of this discrepancy: the purchase price is visible during the purchasing process, but the follow-up costs are not, at least not in their exact amount. The EU Energy Label can be considered as a solution to close this gap. During the past decades, there has been a discussion on whether it would be better to communicate the monetary costs associated with energy consumption, since their calculation by the consumer is difficult or needs a high level of cognitive effort.
In this study, experiments and field studies on a total of 19 product groups were evaluated with regard to the question of whether the indication of costs instead of physical units affects the decision-making process of the consumer. It has been assessed under which circumstances it might positively influence the purchase decision of the customer, i.e. helping him or her to arrive at a more “energy efficient” decision. Overall, the results indicate that monetary claims possibly exceed the effect of claims on a physical basis when the costs or the differences between the alternatives available seem “relevant” to the consumer.
The individual willingness to pay for sustainable products is significantly influenced by the climate crisis, but is also affected due to additional international crises as the still ongoing pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The better a product labelling is designed, the more likely consumers are to make a well-considered purchase decision at the point-of-sale, which in turn increases the product lifetime of the devices.
The results of this study are based on two consumer surveys with a total of 590 participants. Consumers were asked to make a simulated purchase decision based on the upcoming EU Energy Label for smartphones. Each consumer was presented comparison labels showing different aspects concerning durability (meaning charging cycles, robustness and IP class), repairability, energy efficiency and product price. In addition, there was a question on energy consumption, which was displayed either in Wh/h or in battery endurance per charge in hours.
The analysis of the survey shows a clear ranking of the preferred properties: 1. Durability as best option, Energy efficiency and Repairability as second and third choice. In all categories, a higher price was accepted in favor of a more environmentally friendly product design. When presenting the energy consumption in Wh/h, no reliable distinguishing between higher or lower values was observed. In contrast, higher values were clearly preferred when choosing between different battery runtimes.
Recommendations will be developed for adjustments to the upcoming EU Energy Label for smartphones and other product labels in the future showing circular economy aspects, such as the durability, repairability, recycled content used during production, recyclability or the total footprint of the product.
As consequence of the European Green Deal and the European Commission's Circular Economy Action Plan, the product landscape in the EU will undergo fundamental changes. The legal requirements for products are being expanded, not least through the Proposal for an Ecodesign Regulation for Sustainable Products published by the European Commission in 2022. Following the current developments, requirements for the circularity of products will be increased next to the already existing minimum requirements for products’ energy efficiency. Following this development, the lead question has to be: Is the market, in particular small- and medium-sized enterprises, well prepared for this planned green transformation of our economy? The answer is: No, not yet.
What is needed are suitable standards for the implementation of these requirements to reduce additional burdens to an appropriate level and to support fair competition between all market actors concerned. The German Institute for Standardization, the German Commission for Electro-technical, Electronic & Information Technologies and the Association of German Engineers have conducted a review study with the aim of identifying fundamental needs for revising existing standards and for creating new standards - both of which are intended to support and accelerate the transformation of the current economy towards a Circular Economy. More than 700.000 normative documents were analyzed, and the results were discussed and consolidated with more than 1000 experts from manufacturers (organizations), consumer- and environmental organizations as well as from the public sector. As a result, more than 200 gaps in the standardization landscape were identified. In this study, we highlight and analyze the most important needs for standardization activities in the field of electrotechnical-, electronic- and ICT-products. In the discussion with the experts for electrotechnical-, electronic- and ICT products, it has been confirmed that a timely implementation of ambitious political decisions of a circular economy requires a normative basis to ensure its consistency. Furthermore, consensus between experts was that legislation in product regulation would be key and should not be extended to the area of waste legislation. As most important standardization activities accompanying product legislation, the following were identified: (i) creation of a set of indicators enabling a holistic assessment of product circularity, (ii) quality assurance of secondary raw materials and consumers awareness of the product circularity both enabled by appropriate analytics and (iii) clear regulation concerning product liability of repaired, refurbished or remanufactured products. One issue of relevance to all experts concerns the product safety, which must not, under any circumstances, decrease when changing product design to reach a higher degree of circularity. The mentioned and further standardization activities would be essential to kick the can down the circular economy road and are analyzed and summarized in this study.
The European Commission adopted an EU Energy Label for smartphones and tablets in June 2023. For the first time, the EU Energy Label will depict, among energy efficiency, also a reparability score, battery endurance, battery lifetime, drop resistance and dust and water ingress protection.
However, does the multitude of parameters bear the risk to confuse consumers instead of triggering environmentally sustainable purchase decisions? In a survey in Germany, consumers were asked to make a choice when the label does not clearly identify the environmentally better product. Instead, energy efficiency has to be valued against reparability, reliability against energy efficiency, and reparability against reliability. The sustainability lever of the different aspects is not the same, as e.g. lifetime extension has a much more positive environmental impact than energy efficiency in case of mobile devices. Therefore, the question remains, whether consumers intuitively make the right choice. Results of the survey indicate that consumers interpret the complex label in the desired manner and value those aspects higher, which indeed have a more positive effect on the environment.