DECC present final draft of the Energy Label Framework

DECC Logo ClearICMMA were invited to DECC’s (The Department of Energy & Climate Change) Stakeholder meeting in London last week where they were presented with the following changes to the 2nd revision:

  • The draft will be a ‘regulation’, not a ‘directive’ as previously intended – A regulation will come into force directly in every Member State whereas a directive has to be implemented in national legislation by each Member State.
  • Labelling will revert to A to G – With blank classes available at the top end to accommodate technological advancements.
  • Rescaling will take place when 30% of the sold products in a year are in the highest energy class following an 18 to 24 month study – although it is doubtful whether the study will take place.
  • There will be transition period of 14 days for re-labelling of products.
  • Despite wide scale industry concerns the product database was kept within the proposal. Details of implementation will be defined by EU COM – At the moment it is only known that the product database will be established by 1st January 2019.
  • Manufacturers will be required to enter product details onto the database, which will be controlled by the EU COM – Details can be entered any time up to placing on the market.

DECC were unable to answer our question about retroactive measures. We were keen to understand what would happen to products already placed becoming incompliant after re-labelling. DECC were quite dismissive of industry’s concerns about the burden of workload, security and competitive confidentiality of complying with the product database requirement.

The final draft has been in Brussels since 11th November, awaiting vote, and is expected to be published 26th November with a final vote taking place in March 2016.

The regulation will come into force as of 1st January 2017.