New EU Labelling Requirements for Smart Phones from 2023

The European Commission, part of the European Union, has made two new proposals that are designed to establish new energy design and ecosmart labelling for tablets and smart phones. These proposals were introduced at the end of August 2022 and they accepted public feedback about the labelling proposals until the 28^th of September. These new European Commission labelling proposals are more extensive than any that have been introduced in the past, and they include things like making batteries replaceable by end-users, durability and endurance requirements, requirements regarding scratch and drop damage resistance, and dirt and water buildup resistance inside devices. They’ve even introduced a new score for repairability!

So what are these new labelling requirements, who do they effect, and what do they mean for you? Don’t worry, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about the new EU labelling requirements for smart phones from 2023.

What Are The Labelling Requirements Called?

One thing that many savvy consumers and researchers want to know is what these labelling requirements are actually called so they can look them up and read about them themselves. Of course, it’s smart to read through documents and learn as much as you can on your own, as this article serves as more of a general overview than a comprehensive explanation of the labelling requirements.

The first directive they’re utilizing is Directive 2009/125/ EC, which lays the groundwork for ecodesign requirements for various devices, like smart phones, tablets and cordless phones. They also used Commission Delegated Regulation supplementing Regulation EU 2017/ 1369 which involves the labelling regulations of mobile devices like tablets and smart phones.

What’s Been Proposed?

Of course, as we’ve said, there have been some labelling requirements that the EU Commission has proposed for mobile devices like cell phones and tablets. But what sorts of things have been proposed? We’ll give you a brief overview of the proposals. (Don’t worry, we’ll go into more detail about the labelling proposals in another section, as well!)

Devices will have to comply to these conditions:

Spare parts of certain varieties (camera and display assemblies, microphones, speakers, memory and SIM cards, etc.) must be made available to device repair professionals, as well as a limited list of parts available for end-users, for 5 or 6 years after manufacture and production of the device. (5 years for smart phones and 5-6 for tablets.) Spare batteries are required to be available for end-user and professional device repairer access, and they must meet certain requirements (such as being resistant to water and dirt buildup in the instance of smart phones).
Products must be better designed to allow for repair and disassembly, as well as to be more durable. Some of the durability requirements proposed include scratch and drop damage resistance, longer battery life and resistance to dust and water buildup inside devices.
Devices will be required to provide more frequent software updates for security and functionality.
Manufacturers will be required to provide information about the percentage of recycled parts that were used to make the device, and how recyclable the device is.
An energy efficiency label has also been proposed for smart phones and tablets. This label will not only display the device’s energy efficiency score, but also a new repairability score.

Who Do The New Labelling Requirements Apply To?

Surely they don’t apply to the average consumer, right? So who do these new labelling requirements apply to? They primarily apply to manufacturers, importers and other authorized representatives who are involved in the manufacture and production process of these devices. They also apply to device suppliers and dealers who sell the devices to the public.

Why Do These New Labelling Requirements Matter to You?

This is a fair question, especially when you consider that most of these requirements apply to individuals and companies involved in the manufacture and sale of these devices.

The labelling requirements proposed by the European Commission define new ecodesign and durability requirements of smart phones and tablet devices. This means that devices on the market after these labelling requirements take effect will not only be more energy efficient than the current devices you can purchase, but that they’ll also be more durable. It will also be easier to get your device repaired by a professional device repairer, and you’ll be able to find someone to change out old parts like batteries, camera assemblies, SIM or memory cards, etc, and mobile devices will be recyclable.

The European Commission has done extensive research into the manufacture and sale of smart phones and tablet devices and found that their production is extremely resource-intensive and they have short lifecycles, resulting in loads of waste.

This means that not only will devices be energy efficient and recyclable, which is more environmentally- conscious, they’ll also last longer and you’ll be able to repair them instead of simply buying a new phone or tablet when yours breaks. Planned obsolescence will be a thing of the past with these proposed labelling requirements, or at least devices won’t be obsolete within a year or two of purchase.

Furthermore, these requirements could have global implications. Not only will these requirements effect the refurbishing and second-hand repair shop industry, they can ship these devices overseas.

When Will These New Requirements Take Effect, and What Are Their Implications?

These labelling requirements will be in effect relatively quickly because the necessary legislative process for them is short. You could see them start taking effect in the first quarter of 2023.

There’s a 12-month transition period that’s been proposed for the new ecodesign requirements, which means you’ll likely start seeing those implemented in early 2024. As far as the energy labelling goes, there’s been an 18 month transitional period proposed, so you can expect to see them taking place around the middle of 2024.

What do these regulations mean for the future? It seems that these new EU labelling requirements are the start of more thorough regulations regarding energy labelling and ecodesign in the future. One of the reasons we think that we’ll see more energy efficiency and ecodesign regulations is because there’s already a proposal that’s been made as part of the European Commission’s Circular Economy Package for a Sustainable Products Initiative. The Sustainable Products Initiative features things like ecodesign requirements that require manufacturers to build recyclable, upgradeable, repairable products (sound familiar?), supply a digital product passport that will allow authorities access to information about the ecodesign aspects of the product, and report the number of unsold goods that are discarded every year, as well as why they’re discarded. You can read more about the Sustainable Products Initiative here.

Key Policy Recommendations

As we promised, we’ll go into more detail about each of the policy recommendations that the European Commission has proposed in regards to energy efficiency labeling and ecodesign for smart phones and tablets.

Security and Functionality updates required for at least 5 years. Early ecodesign proposal drafts called for 3 years of security and functionality updates, which the commission found to not be long enough because their research showed that the average lifetime of these devices is limited to 2-3 years. The European Commission looked at the OS support of the biggest smart phone and tablet manufacturer on the market in Europe, Apple. Apple’s current policy is to support new devices for up to 5 years, with Google and Samsung following Apple’s lead and extending their OS support to 4 years. The European Commission feels that there’s no reason they should be satisfied with anything less in terms of OS support than what’s already available on the market. The longer requirement for security and functionality updates means that users will be able to access third-party apps for a bit longer, which will make the devices useable for longer before users need to purchase new devices.
New repairability score will be displayed on the Energy Label (EL). The European
Commission feels that the repairability and upgradeability of the device is important, and that this score should be displayed along with the energy efficiency score of smart phones and tablets. This score should reflect how easily a device can be repaired or upgraded. The current Energy Label (EL) doesn’t display this information, and there’s not a method for calculating the repairability of a device, but they’ve proposed using the French method for calculating the repairability of devices, called Indice de Reparabilite.
Device repairs are required to be opened up to independent professional device repairers. The goal here is to make it easier for customers to repair their devices, as opposed to fully replacing them. The European Commission has proposed that this is most easily done by opening up smart phone and tablet repairs to repair shops, which are often more accessible to the average consumer.
A new scale for water and dirt buildup resistance, displayed on labelling. The current scale for dirt and water ingress isn’t clear to the average consumer. There’s a number listed on previous energy labelling drafts that’s labelled “IP” (Ingress Protection), followed by two numbers, which looks something like this: “IP72”. The European Commission proposes a scale running from A to D, instead, which is easier to understand.
Affordable prices for spare parts. Past drafts of this proposal indicated that the prices of spare parts for smart phones and tablets aren’t allowed to raise until after the specified time period for their required availability (5 years for smart phones and 5-6 for tablets). But it never specified how much these spare parts should cost. They’ve now added a section that says the parts should be reasonably or proportionally priced.
Class A energy efficiency score will be empty when the regulations are first implemented. The entire idea behind implementing these new labelling requirments is to foster progress and improvement in technology. So, that can’t really happen if devices start out in the highest class and the European Commission has proposed that Class A should remain empty for a while after implementing the new labelling requirements so that manufacturers have the opportunity to improve the energy efficiency of their products. There are currently smart phone and tablet device products that sit in the Class A category, but that’s not allowed under this new proposal and the Class A category will become empty when the labelling requirements are implemented in 2023.
Two different suggestions to clarify the test conditions that determine a device’s EEI. Currently, tests are ran to determine the endurance of a battery. These tests involve performing one task or running one program repeatedly to see how many times it can be performed or ran before the battery runs out of energy. For instance, how many times can a particular video be watch, how many text messages can be sent, or how many phone calls can be made before the battery dies? The European Commission had proposed two different suggestions to standardize this process and more definitively find information about the endurance of smart phone and tablet batteries.

Suggestion 1: The European Commission has suggested that none of the tests that are typically ran to determine how long a battery lasts should be interrupted by pop-ups, which are typically present when a battery starts getting low on energy.

Suggestion 2: The European Commission has suggested that a website should be agreed upon and standardized for the web browsing test conducted on batteries. They’ve said that this website should contain pictures that would be close in size and representative of “real-life conditions” that users will likely experience.

Both suggestions aim to standardize the testing process and make it emmulate the real-life user experience, and also eliminate loopholes in the testing process which are currently present and can be taken advantage of.