Among the European Commission’s summer package of proposed energy-related legislation is a new Energy Labelling Regulation to replace the current Framework Directive.

This envisages abandoning the plusses that were introduced in the last revision to cope with those products that have improved beyond A over the past 20 years. Existing labels would have to be revised within five years to match this new Regulation.

Among other changes it is proposed that all energy labels should be revised periodically, with both old and new labels being supplied (but not displayed) simultaneously for a certain period; that the top scales would be expected to remain empty for up to 10 years; and that empty classes at the bottom of the scale should not be shown. So large white goods might have an A-D scale with C being the best available on the market. Or not.

The draft legislation also proposes setting up a pan European database of all the labelled products on the market.

AMDEA is involved in discussions with CECED and we have also sent comments to DECC on what we see as the main problems with the draft. Member States are due to discuss an amended version on 28 September.