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EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

energy-efficient-products.ec.europa.eu

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Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#51

Post by drooopy »

myrmidon wrote: post #3

Nice page! I'm extremely happy about efforts like this. You might argue that the EU is a sprawling, wasteful bureaucracy and you would not be wrong, per se, but they made a lot of useful laws that just simply make the world a better place. Having standardized chargers for phones and laptops is SUPER nice and would never have happened without intervention IMO. The only equivalent for US "useful, average-citizen friend…

Actually, I would argue against EU being a wasteful bureaucracy. From my experience they're more efficient than most member state governments.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#52

Post by alnwlsn »

magnetometer wrote: post #47
alnwlsn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does it even mean for a TV to be energy efficient? A TV's job is to convert electricity into... light, I guess? It's not light like a light bulb, nor would you want it to be. You wouldn't light your home with TVs. So is it something like "only produces light where needed on the screen" or "uses the least energy when turned off" or "does image processing for x format with the least energy" What are they measuring…

Yes,measuring the energy consumption and efficiency of the conversion from electricity to light is part of the label. The light bulb example is not as unsuitable as you seem to assume. Incandescent light bulbs only convert about 5 percent of the energy consumed to light, the rest is converted to heat. LEDs, in contrast, are 6 to 8 times more efficient. Your "does image processing..." part is also important. Different…

I meant it's it's physics job to produce light. If it does that efficiently, great! That's one thing you should want.

It's human job is to convey information. If you're measuring efficiency that way, it would be most efficient to have the dimmest screen possible (using the least energy) as long as you can still tell what's happening on screen. If that's already happening, then surely a screen twice as bright as you need it to be would use twice the energy and be half as efficient, even if it physically is equally as efficient making light at any brightness.

You could be using half the energy to do the "same" job.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#53

Post by myrmidon »

ltbarcly3 wrote: post #38

This is just me thinking this through and is not a claim to be authoritative whatsoever. The average power draw of a cell phone is what, 4 watts? 6 watts? Lets say 10W, which is silly high (most can only charge at around 20W for an hour and a charge lasts at least 12 hours, but lets just take a high number.) At 10W constant draw it would consume 87,600Wh per year. Lets round up for inefficiencies and call it 100kWh.…

> I will wager that the cost of compliance will dramatically increase, however.

What makes you confident in that assumption? Because I would wager that cost of compliance is gonna be pretty much negligible, because manufacturers have most of the numbers already anyway, and this pales in comparison to EMF testing, too.

Estimates for effects of the regulation are right there-- they hope for total savings of 8TWh within 2030, but mainly from longer product lifetime through devices staying functional for longer on old batteries and easier battery repairability.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#54

Post by benjymo »

alnwlsn wrote: post #26
wiz21c wrote: post #13

In the shop in my town, they sell televisions. Led ones, oled ones, big screen, the usual stuff. They have about 50 models. All have energy labels C or worse. No A, no A+, no B... Once there was an A one but the picture quality was horrible. I'm happy to be more conscious, but someone is working against the scheme: I don't have a real choice...

What does it even mean for a TV to be energy efficient? A TV's job is to convert electricity into... light, I guess? It's not light like a light bulb, nor would you want it to be. You wouldn't light your home with TVs. So is it something like "only produces light where needed on the screen" or "uses the least energy when turned off" or "does image processing for x format with the least energy" What are they measuring…

You can check the label here https://energy-efficient-products.ec.europa.eu/product-list/....

It's the electricity usage when running the TV. There is e.g. quite a difference between LED and OLED.

TVs is also quite a large part of electricity usage in a household. Maybe 75 - 150W running a few hours a day. You have to keep in mind that not many people have PCs, NAS, etc. running 24/7.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#55

Post by friendzis »

greatgib wrote: post #14

I have mixed feeling about this. On one side, it is good to have consumer friendly regulation like manufacturers to be forced to support right to repair. But on the opposite side, lots of bullshit requirements again like the energy labelling, that will do that we have less products, mostly from big actors only, and more expensive due the then useless regulation barrier. And the mixed feeling is stronger for things li…

> that they have to release in open source the software, blueprints or tools that are needed to be able to support your own device yourself.

You can safely bet that there is no end product [you care this regulation to apply to] that has 100% in-house engineering, unencumbered with licenses. This would be either unenforceable or eliminate all but the largest players from EU market.

If you look at a distance, most of these regulations simply mandate managing product lifecycle. Yes, you can enter the market quicker and cheaper if you don't think about eventual recycling or bodger together something that barely works. We take warranties for granted now, but warranties are part of this family of regulations: if you introduce a product to the market, introduce something that is actually functional.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#56

Post by ltbarcly3 »

myrmidon wrote: post #53
ltbarcly3 wrote: post #38

This is just me thinking this through and is not a claim to be authoritative whatsoever. The average power draw of a cell phone is what, 4 watts? 6 watts? Lets say 10W, which is silly high (most can only charge at around 20W for an hour and a charge lasts at least 12 hours, but lets just take a high number.) At 10W constant draw it would consume 87,600Wh per year. Lets round up for inefficiencies and call it 100kWh.…

> I will wager that the cost of compliance will dramatically increase, however. What makes you confident in that assumption? Because I would wager that cost of compliance is gonna be pretty much negligible, because manufacturers have most of the numbers already anyway, and this pales in comparison to EMF testing, too. Estimates for effects of the regulation are right there-- they hope for total savings of 8TWh within…

> Estimates for effects of the regulation are right there-- they hope for total savings of 8TWh within 2030, but mainly from longer product lifetime through devices staying functional for longer on old batteries and easier battery repairability.

That's an interesting point I didn't realize. I still don't see how they can get to those numbers, do they quote the calculations somewhere? I toned down the claim to be less hyperbolic based on your feedback here.

I wonder how often a recent generation phone is replaced due to battery life issues, especially considering the 'smart charging' features that phones have now which makes battery wear a fraction of what it was previously (such as charging to 80% max, 'smart' slow charging at night instead of fast charging, etc)

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#57

Post by sofixa »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #11
myrmidon wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I (unironically) love how the charts are basically "this is gonna save you money by you buying less shit/year, you're welcome".

If only the EU was like "you can save money and our environment by buying Chinese EVs instead of smokey German, Italian & French diesels" in the same spirit. Oh well. It's pretty easy to regulate things that aren't made by your domestic companies.

The choice isn't between a Chinese EV and an Italian diesel car. There are plenty of EVs by EU based manufacturers, including affordable ones from e.g. Renault/Dacia.

Sacrificing the European automakers for a temporary discount would be very foolish.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#58

Post by Y-bar »

pornel wrote: post #49
microtonal wrote: post #21

availability of operating system upgrades for longer periods (at least 5 years from the date of the end of placement on the market of the last unit of a product model) This is so great! A lot of manufacturers were counting from the date of introduction. A lot of phones only had a 3 year support period. If they are on the market for two years, the people buying last would only get one year of support. This swaps to th…

I wonder if we get some malicious workarounds for this, like re-releasing the same phone under different SKUs to pretend they were different models on sale for a short time.

Maybe, but the regulation tries to prevent this by separating "models" from "batches" from "individual items" and defaults to "model" when determining compatibility. Worth noting is that each new model requires a separate filing for both EcoDesign and other certifications like CE which could help reduce workarounds like model number inflation.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#59

Post by myrmidon »

betaby wrote: post #43
drstewart wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you share some equivalent Japanese laws that make the world a better place, or maybe Australian ones? Or are there none? :(

> laws that make the world a better place That's a bizarre starting point to me. Iphone / Android made/make the world a better place. There were no laws mandating creation of them!

I'm not saying that you need laws to make the world better, just that some of them do.

This belongs in that category in my opinion because it is something that costs very little in absolute terms (manufacturer has to run some tests and print some numbers that they probably already had), but it makes the whole system work better because it enables people to vote with their wallet, and gets inefficient products eliminated because people can spot them before sale.

No company would advertise a "20% below average battery lifetime" without regulation like this, which is why objectively bad devices can still get sold easily on unregulated markets.

Re: EU Energy labelling will apply to phones and tablets from June 2025

#60

Post by myrmidon »

drstewart wrote: post #37
myrmidon wrote: post #3

Nice page! I'm extremely happy about efforts like this. You might argue that the EU is a sprawling, wasteful bureaucracy and you would not be wrong, per se, but they made a lot of useful laws that just simply make the world a better place. Having standardized chargers for phones and laptops is SUPER nice and would never have happened without intervention IMO. The only equivalent for US "useful, average-citizen friend…

Can you share some equivalent Japanese laws that make the world a better place, or maybe Australian ones? Or are there none? :(

For Japan, I think allowing income tax redirection to a "home town" is a really good model to keep infrastructure funded in more rural areas that suffer from brain drain/exodus.
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