First the response from the "best" worst website on the net WUWT:
From Watts:
One more reason to dump the EU- they are going to make criminals out of average people who just want to keep their home clean. – Anthony
Eric Worrall says: August 22, 2014 at 9:46 pm
In a totalitarian state, the measure of your power is how much misery you can cause
dp says: August 22, 2014 at 10:40 pm
It’s just starting. A utopian’s work is never done. Ever. The EU is the new and improved 1000 year reich. This is what happens when none of your founding documents begin with “We the people…”.
Jim G says: August 22, 2014 at 10:51 pm
And now, from the people who brought you RoHS.
but then at last there is sense
SidF says: August 23, 2014 at 2:28 am
I have a 1400 W Dyson that has very strong suction, so much so that on older carpets it can difficult to push. So 1600 W should be more than enough for a well designed cleaner. Dyson led the way in the transition to more efficient cyclone bagless cleaners and now dominate the UK market. The Hoover brand in the UK is owned by Candy, an Italian washing machine and white goods company and their floor cleaners are probably designed and made outside the UK. Hoover cleaners were very slow to adopt cyclones as the throw away bag filter was the most profitable part of the product offering.
I would think only a very small proportion of cleaners on the UK market are over 1400 W.
Not everything the EU does will be big money savers though. Some things are, such as the requirement to limit stand by power consumption on some home electronics to 1 W. I have a small older Sony hi fi that consumes 25 W on stand by….so the EU must have made some bif power savings there.
And haven’t they mandated that all phone chargers are mini USB to stop the proliferation of different charger connectiors we used to have?
Now from the manufacturers:
Dyson http://www.dyson.co.uk/energy-ratings.aspx
Leading the campaign for efficient motors.
Dyson has never engineered a machine with a motor rated higher than 1600W. We campaigned for motor wattage caps for vacuum cleaners, and welcome the fact that the energy label will introduce a maximum power input for new vacuum cleaners, capping motors at 1600W in order to reduce their electricity usage.
from a Hoover info page:
http://www.hoover.co.uk/small-appliances/vacuum-cleaners/upright-vacuum-cleaners/tp71tp02001-turbo-power-bagless-pets-upright-vacuum-cleaner/
Motor size (new) 700 W (watts)
Motor size (new)850 W (watts)
Samsung seem to have a design problem (2.1kW)
Numatic Henry
600/1200W
power between 800 and 2200W
800W
--------------------
It seems to me that there is no problem with 1.6kW motors and even 900W motors. The design is the thing. and some people are better at design than others!
So in all it seems that the new EU regulation is not going to cause longer use of the cleaner it will simply stop inefficient design.
However it will not save much energy - using Dysons figures
Dyson has always shown that through efficient engineering, high performance can be achieved with low power – and we’re trying to encourage others to do the same. We have successfully lobbied the European Union to introduce a cap on the size of vacuum motors from 2014. The estimated energy savings from the EU Ecodesign and Energy Labelling measures for vacuum cleaners amount to 19 Terawatt hours of electricity per year by 2020. This corresponds to an estimated 8 million tons of CO2
19 Terra watt hours (19e12) sounds a lot but this equates to 2.2GW generator running continuously. I.e. a couple of power stations over the whole of the EU
The regulation of maximum standby power to less than 1W on things like wall-warts TVs satellite receivers, hi-fi etc save perhaps more than 750MW power per year in UK alone.
The comment on RoHS from the watts site is just plain ludicrous. The proliferation of electronics in society and the " I must have the new best" throw-away culture would mean Lead pollution. The requirement for manufacturers to take back and recycle the stuff to me just makes sense.
The CE mark (which does not mean China Export!!) SHOULD guarantee that the item you purchased conforms to EU safety and EMC requirements and the benefit to society should be obvious. It does require more testing and proving - and hence higher cost - to the manufacturer but again the benefits are worth it.
Without such regulations the west would be fighting fog and pollution as China is today. No manufacturer would comply without government regulation (why should I lose profit when other companies are not) following the low pollution course)
