Enforcement of energy efficiency regulations for energy consuming equipment: findings from a new European study
Summary
Like other major economies, the European Union applies a variety of energy labelling and minimum energy efficiency standards regulations to energy using equipment. Each EU and EEA Member State has responsibility to enforce these regulations; however, in practice the level of enforcement effort varies substantially from one economy to another while the loss of cost-effective energy savings through weak enforcement effort across Europe as a whole remains significant.
This paper from CLASP, Navigant Consulting Europe and N14 Energy reports the results of the most detailed study yet undertaken into enforcement of European equipment energy efficiency regulations. It examines the legal basis for enforcement, the institutional arrangements to ensure compliance, the technical competence of entities responsible for compliance, the procedures to be followed to monitor the market and in the event of non-compliance, the penalties applied for non-compliance, the resources committed to enforcement and the degree of cooperation over enforcement between EU Member States.
It further assesses the extent of energy losses and costs attributable to imperfect enforcement for each economy and determines the extra savings that would be associated with a stronger enforcement effort as well as the expected benefit-costs from doing so.
Lastly, it presents new thinking on practical and politically viable means of strengthening enforcement at an affordable cost and sets out a viable pathway to substantially improve the situation across Europe as a whole.
