The Commission of the European Union (EU) has issued a Regulation implementing new eco-design and energy efficiency requirements for vacuum cleaners.
The Regulation, which was published in July 2013 in the Official Journal of the European Union, is considered an implementation measure under the EU’s Eco-Design Directive, 2009/125/EC. That directive gives the Commission the authority to establish minimum efficiency standards for those “energy-related products representing significant volume of sales and trade, having significant environmental impact and presenting significant potential for improvement in terms of their environmental impact without entailing excessive costs.”
The new eco-design and energy efficiency requirements for vacuum cleaners come into effect beginning in September 2014, and are detailed in Annex I of the Regulation. Annex II of the Regulation defines the methods for the measurement and calculation of energy efficiency, while Annex III details the procedures to be used by authorities in EU member states for verifying compliance with the Regulation’s requirements.
