Towards the elimination of incandescent bulbs in the EU 03/03/2008 12:26 by Victor Roux-Goeken
The eco-design directive should be revised during 2008. Currently concerning 20 groups of everyday consumer products, it should go up to 25. The Commission wants to take advantage of this to ban incandescent bulbs.
In these times of predicted energy shortage and increasing concentration of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere, the incandescent bulb is heresy in many ways. According to the European Commission, electric lighting generates the equivalent of 70% of GHG emissions from passenger cars worldwide, and it is particularly energy inefficient. Used for 130 years, the incandescent bulb wastes 90% of the energy used in the form of heat.
Suddenly, the European Commission plans to ban incandescent bulbs. Or, more precisely, "to introduce energy efficiency criteria such that they would make it impossible for them to access the market", explains Ferran Tarradellas Espuny, spokesperson for the Commission's Directorate-General for Industry.
Of course, with this measure, factor 4 will not be reached tomorrow. But this ban would already be a small step in the right direction. Replacing incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs - also called low consumption - will save 45 billion kilowatt hours in the European Union each year, calculates the Commission. Or the annual electricity consumption, all devices combined, of 10 million households in the EU.
The ban will go through the revision of the eco-design directive (1), which aims to improve the efficiency of certain groups of products. Its scope should be extended to 25 in 2008 or 2009 (20 currently). Still, "the Commission's decision will not be made without an economic and environmental impact study," said the spokesperson. And it will only affect bulbs in stock, not those on the market. ”
A point of view welcomed by the European recycling union, which advocates a progressive elimination of incandescent bulbs: 100 watts in 2009, 75 watts in 2011, etc. "The industry cannot immediately ensure the production of low-consumption light bulbs," judges Christophe Bresson, director of communications at Philips Lighting, one of the market leaders. In any case, it is time to pass the course: the lighting industry is the only one to have made almost no modification to its main product, since the beginning of its marketing. " Philips guarantees that it will be able to remove mercury from low-consumption lamps, which makes it a "dangerous" waste, in the coming years.
(1) The eco-design directive (2005/32 / EC) concerns in particular heating and hot water production equipment, electric motors, lighting in the residential and tertiary sectors, household appliances, equipment office in the residential and tertiary sectors, consumer electronics and HVAC systems (heating, ventilation and air conditioning). It will be extended among others to bulbs, chargers and batteries, washing machines and cars.
Source: http://www.journaldelenvironnement.net/ ... DE&ctx=129
Edit: it's confirmed https://www.econologie.com/forums/interdicti ... t6676.html
