New EU Rules Will Limit Vacuum Cleaners To 1600W

AmiMoJo writes "New EU rules are limiting vacuum cleaner motors to 1600W from 2014/09/01. The EU summary of the new rules explains that consumers currently equate watts with cleaning power, which is not the case. Manufacturers will be required to put ratings on packaging, including energy efficiency, cleaning efficiency on hard and carpeted floors, and dust emissions from the exhaust. In the EU vacuum cleaners use more energy than the whole of Denmark, and produce more emissions than dishwashers and washing machines."

Re:Do the math

[anarcobra]

I love them. And I will try to keep getting them. If the problem is that people equate cleaning power with Watts, they should mandate some measurement of cleaning factor instead of maximum power. Then people can determine if they want the 2100 W vacuum cleaner, or the 1600 one with the same cleaning factor. I see what happens at other peoples houses. They have their eco vacuum and the cat hair just stays on the floor if you don't pas over it 10 times. It's the same thing with all their washing machines. In the US washing my clothes takes about 1 hour for washing and 40 minutes for drying. In the EU with all their eco washing machines it takes 2 and half hours for washing clothes (one and a half for quick) and 80 minutes to dry it. Is it more eco-friendly? I'm sure it is. But in return I have to actually plan out when I'm going to wash my clothes because it takes twice as long. Maybe I just have a bad washing machine, but all the ones I've used here are like this.

Re:Do the math

[zephvark]

There are manufacturers selling 2000-2200 W. vacuum cleaners.

I can't wait for those to be gone. Not because of the energy usage really, but because those monsters are incredibly loud.

I might point out that the power of the vacuum cleaner has no relationship to its noise level. The noise is considered a selling point, a feature, because people have this curious tendency to think, "oh yes, that's causing me permanent ear damage, so it must be doing a good job." People conflate noise with power.

Don't ask about the dust in the corner. I'm protecting my ears. I swear it.

US Energy Star and vaccuum cleaners

[dkegel]

The US doesn't have Energy Star standards for vacuum cleaners yet, but they're thinking about it.

http://www.energystar.gov/ia/p... [energystar.gov] says
"[Assuming efficiency improvements of 16% to 33%...] Estimated per-unit annual savings for residential vacuums are on the order of 10-19 kWh/year... Considering there are approximately 28 million vacuums sold in the U.S. each year, the national energy savings opportunity would be on the order of 67,000-135,000 MWh per year if 25% of products sold were replaced with energy efficient models"

Contrast that the the document linked in TFA:
http://ec.europa.eu/smart-regu... [europa.eu] says
"[Vaccuum cleaners sold per year in 2005 and 2020: 54 million and 92 million]... [Energy consumed by vacuum cleaners under business-as-usual by 2020: 29.7 TWH/year]... by 2020, the annual electricity consumption ... of vacuum cleaners will be reduced by 19 TWh"

So, 67 TWh annual savings in US vs. 19 TWh annual savings in EU in spite of twice as many vacuum cleaners sold per year in the EU. Is there just more dirt in the US? Or was the Energy Star scoping report just overoptimistic?

Re:Waaah.

[jonbryce]

Because the sort of things you see on sale in Best Buy in the US are the sort of things you can only find in museums in the UK. Things like stove-top kettles and top-loading washing machines.