The Commission welcomes the provisional agreement reached last night between the European Parliament and the Council on the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation. It will help make sustainable products the new norm in the EU, by making them last longer, use energy and resources more efficiently, easier to repair and recycle, contain fewer substances of concern and include more recycled content. It will also improve the level playing field for sustainable products on the EU's internal market and strengthen the global competitiveness of businesses offering sustainable products.
Making sustainable products the norm
The new law will build on the existing Ecodesign Directive that has successfully driven the improved energy efficiency of products in the EU for almost 20 years. It will allow to progressively set performance and information requirements for key products placed on the EU market.
The Commission will adopt and regularly update a list of products identified on the basis of a thorough analysis and criteria notably related to the EU's climate, environment and energy efficiency objectives. This way, the Commission will ensure predictability and transparency on which products will be covered when. Priority will be given to highly impactful products, including textiles (especially garments and footwear), furniture (including mattresses), iron and steel, aluminium, tyres, paints, lubricants and chemicals, as well as energy related products, ICT products and other electronics.
The new Ecodesign requirements will go beyond energy efficiency and aim to boost circularity, covering, among others:
- product durability, reusability, upgradability, and repairability
- presence of chemical substances that inhibit reuse and recycling of materials
- energy and resource efficiency
- recycled content
- carbon and environmental footprints
- available product information, in particular a Digital Product Passport.
The new Regulation also contains novel measures to end the wasteful and environmentally harmful practice of destroying unsold consumer products. Companies will have to take measures to prevent this practice, and the co-legislators introduced a direct ban on destruction of unsold textiles and footwear products, with derogations for small companies and a transition period for medium-sized ones. Over time, other sectors could be covered by such bans, if needed.
In addition, large companies will need to disclose every year how many unsold consumer products they discard and why. This is expected to strongly disincentivise businesses from engaging in this practice.
Better information for consumers
