JBDragon, yes you are paying for your electricity but the country is collectively paying for the environmental and energy waste impact when millions of people do the same. Aside from energy consumed by some devices, they may also be hard to recycle and their production / disposal might involve toxic materials.
Leaving things in the hands of consumers is all well and good, but most of the time, the environmental impact or consumption of the device is WAY down the list on the purchaser's mind. In Europe large appliances like freezers, cookers, washing machines are required to display energy ratings with A+ being the best and G being the worst. The scheme is also being extended to lightbulbs and cars. I see no issue with mandating the same be applied to TVs, DVD/BD players, consoles, computers etc. IMO its long overdue, and might actually make the running cost of equipment more prominent to users.
I see no issue either with restrictions on energy consumption on classes of devices. I have no idea if plasmas are actually going to be banned or if this is The Daily Fail doing its usual scaremongering but it would surprise me if most of them were tagged with a D or E rating even if they did continue to be sold. This alone might be enough to kill sales.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
DrXym @ Jan 13th 2009 10:48AM
JBDragon, yes you are paying for your electricity but the country is collectively paying for the environmental and energy waste impact when millions of people do the same. Aside from energy consumed by some devices, they may also be hard to recycle and their production / disposal might involve toxic materials.
Leaving things in the hands of consumers is all well and good, but most of the time, the environmental impact or consumption of the device is WAY down the list on the purchaser's mind. In Europe large appliances like freezers, cookers, washing machines are required to display energy ratings with A+ being the best and G being the worst. The scheme is also being extended to lightbulbs and cars. I see no issue with mandating the same be applied to TVs, DVD/BD players, consoles, computers etc. IMO its long overdue, and might actually make the running cost of equipment more prominent to users.
I see no issue either with restrictions on energy consumption on classes of devices. I have no idea if plasmas are actually going to be banned or if this is The Daily Fail doing its usual scaremongering but it would surprise me if most of them were tagged with a D or E rating even if they did continue to be sold. This alone might be enough to kill sales.