The French sustainability index project has been in trouble for several months. In October 2023, the European Commission expressed its reservations with regard to the French project. She considered that the French initiative duplicated the provisions of a European regulation. This regulation provides for the display of an energy label on smartphones and tablets placed on the market from 2025.
In a letter responding to the Commission, the French authorities explain “that they will not publish the text in question, in order to take into account the Commission’s concerns.” The planned sustainability index is therefore forgotten in favor of the European energy label project.
The French project aimed to propose a more advanced version of the repairability index, implemented in 2021.
Avoid double labeling
The durability index had to take into account the parameters already analyzed by the repairability index, but also added new indices:
- Resistance to falls, water, shock
- Guarantees offered
- Manufacturer update policy.
The final result was to allow the attribution of a score out of 10 to the product, which would have been displayed on the packaging of smartphones and tablets sold commercially. The implementation of this index, initially governed by a law passed in 2020, was planned for the beginning of 2024.
Divergent calculations
For the European Commission, the French project encroached on a European regulation which came into force in September 2023. This provides for the display of an energy label for smartphones and tablets from 2025.
The Commission feared that the coexistence of these two displays would lead “to divergent indices, depending on the market for which the product is intended, which may not only be restrictive for economic operators, but also lead to confusion with regard to the information provided to consumers.”
The energy label of the European project includes part of the information initially provided for by the French project. But it uses different calculation methods for the indices which constitute the final score awarded to the product.
“As a result, consumers will be presented with two different smartphone repairability indicators, which will take into account similar parameters but calculate them differently,” the Commission wrote in its October opinion. Faced with the Commission, France therefore prefers to bow.
Several organizations committed to consumer defense including HOP, iFixit and the manufacturer of Fairphone have denounced the weaknesses of the European approach, reports Le Monde. This index does not take into account the sometimes significant cost of spare parts for certain devices. Associations have already been denouncing for several years the weaknesses of the previous repairability index put in place by France. We will now have to bring criticism to the European level.