The EU is now in the process of taking away larger size electric appliances from consumers, saying they consume too much energy. Small appliances are enough for the citizens and they’ll just have to learn to like them.
EU banning “energy-hungry” vacuum cleaners
Incandescent light bulbs have already been removed from the shelves. Next being removed are larger size vacuum cleaners. Germany’s online flagship daily the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) reports: “Beginning September 2014 in the EU only vacuum cleaners that consume less than 1600 watts may be sold. From 2017 only a maximum of 900 watts will be allowed.”
Hat-tip: DirkH
The FAZ writes that the ban was very quietly passed by Brussels some weeks ago, going unnoticed by the public.
Vacuum cleaners will also carry a sticker informing the consumer of the appliance’s energy efficiency rating. The EU thinks it can save energy by forcing consumers to buy only small appliances.
Whether the intrusion by the state will have an effect on overall electricity consumption remains a question. Smaller vacuum cleaners will only mean that housewives (and many husbands, of course) will have to spend twice as long vacuuming to get the house clean, and so may end up using even more electricity. This is the latest Brussels eco-justified intrusion into the free market and our private lives.
To be fair, the FAZ does write that the manufacturers of vacuum cleaners have pretty much accepted the law without protest, as most cleaners are already below the 1600-watt limit. However, a couple of high-end vacuum cleaner manufacturers, such as Vorwerk, are resisting.
What’s next?
The FAZ writes that not only light bulbs and vacuum cleaners are targeted for higher efficiency, but also an entire range of appliances. This is all in the wake of the European Ecodesign Directive, which will go into effect on November 1st for clothes dryers. “For condensation tumbler dryers, the weighted condensation efficiency must not be less than 60 percent.”
This latest additional government encroachment into private lives is necessary, European bureaucrats believe. Citizens have to stop being wasteful and it’s past time to rescue the planet from dangerous climate change, so claim the nannies in Brussels and other European capitals. It’s all for our own good.
How could people have come to accept being treated like irresponsible children who need to be nannied 24 hours a day? Surely if a poll were taken in Europe, a majority of citizens indeed would agree that they really are too stupid to make their own personal decisions and so it’s best that the state decides simple things for them, like the purchase of an appliance.
A large part of the European citizens have been brainwashed into believing this.
Recently the EU attempted to force consumers to have only the option of buying cars that emit low levels of CO2. But Angela Merkel resisted the move, claiming that Germany’s powerful automotive industry needs more time to make its cars more efficient.
You really should have a direct line of communication to the Daily Mail/ Telegraph. So many items that the British press never seem to discover.
Look at the Daily Mail’s Syria war reporting. They’re basically the NATO’s printing press. No photoshop job too silly. Daily Mail has a history of that at least back to the start of WW 2.
Learn how to spell October. It’s not Oktober, ha ha! The government should have a high tek way to control how much power people use so like if they use the washing machine for more than 2 hours a week the government can shut it off so it don’t work until next week. Since less coal is available and power plants shutting down so government should oversee what people are using too much in the home and turn off wasteful appliances. Also government should be able to turn heat thermstat down so everybody’s is the same. Government should try this in a cold weather state like minnesota as experiment
Aren’t you the cutest little communist……
Um, prof, it is the GOVERNMENT that is shutting down the bloomin’ power plants, not because we’re running out of coal. My god, are you really that stupid? We have enough coal to last the planet at least 600 more years.
And I would love to know your “reason” for everybody’s thermostat being the same.
*-tech
In Germany it’s Spelled OKTOBER. You are making assumptions unnecessary. Europe is for the most cold in Winter and they do not have AC. I suggest you live in a colder climate at 10 degrees lower than normal. Stupid is priceless.
Does this include commercial/industrial vacuum cleaners??
http://www.cleanstore.co.uk/products/productslistSub.asp?Main=Industrial-Vacuums&sub=Dual-Motor-Industrial-Vacuums
Supermarket bags for life found to be festering with bugs, cool water washing machines having a similar effect, vaccuum cleaners that won’t clean – all brought to you by the cesspit of Brussels.
Who’s the dirty man of Europe now?
Bubonic plague anyone?
Don’t these turkeys have something better to do for Christmas?
Christmas? These vampires will be drinking fresh baby blood that day. Socialism=the philosophy of death.
I have a feeling that the EU isn’t going to be much longer for this world if they insist in perpetuating this insanity. At some point people are just going to ignore them.
So far a majority thinks it’s the right thing to do and they really believe that they are doing their part to save the planet.
Yes, the majority are just like sheep, they just follow. What hope is there?
Well, maybe a lot of that comes from the indoctrination that makes energy itself seem like some sort of pollutant. Germany could have very inexpensive and abundant energy if not for propaganda and the politics of fear. Fukushima has a casualty count of zero killed, zero injured, zero sickened. Three Mile Island didn’t kill anyone either. Chernobyl killed 64 total, immediate and follow-on. A train load of oil killed 47 in Quebec, Canada this year and that is only the fifth worst train accident Canada has ever seen. The problem is that people have a warped sense of risk due to all the misinformation that gets pumped out there. More people die from organic fruits and vegetables every year than from nuclear energy yet they would tell you that organic foods are good for you and nuclear energy is bad. It’s just insanity.
Brussels = Sacramento writ REALLY large.
It would be far more effective to make energy unaffordable for the average consumer, but they are doing their best to make that happen.
A few weeks ago Obama directed his EPA to make coal powerd electric plants pay high fines or stop running . All to make wind and solar more attractive. Well most of the USA’s electric power comes from coal…. so I guess we all will be taking it up the @as cause he needs to give money to GE or some solar buddy that gives him cash.
Its a sick world when you are told you must pay more for less.
I really like this concept. There are 1 million possibilities for government to intervene in wasteful energy utilization. Several that I really like are setting a maximum horsepower for marine engines on pleasure boats at 15 (11 KW) and cars at a maximum horsepower of 30 (22 KW). Similarly, lawnmowers could be restricted to those not having a motor.
There are all sorts of big power users in hospitals. This might result in a few more patient deaths, but healthcare costs would tumble as doctors would be back to 18 century practices.
NHS would be rolling in money as they would have nothing to spend it on.
It would also be interesting to investigate the savings involved with eliminating motorized vehicles from the military. It would also give horses more to do them carrying around red clad millionaires chasing foxes. There is no end to the possibilities.
“NHS would be rolling in money as they would have nothing to spend it on.”
I am sure the directors of the NHS have enough cousins who could serve as very high-rated consultants to solve that problem.
I think the German state broadcasters operate under that principle.
Ban politicians from re-producing, we don’t need anymore useless eaters with horrible ideas.
What if people just start shooting them instead? Lol if they’re going to make life hell we might as well make it so thy can no longer appear in public. Lol oh wait. They banned most guns in Europe. Never mind.
How will we stop these lunatics interfering in every aspect of our lives
Absolutely bizarre. How long per week does the average domestic vacuum cleaner work? It’s hardly a full time job. And as you point out Pierre, it’s likely more time will now be needed for those using underpowered machines.
Just another example of seeming, not doing.
Probably 30 minutes, maybe 60?
They’re only getting started – the sky is the limit. Next is regulating your hot water, then your water consumption. Before too long they’ll be telling us when to cook and to dry our hair. They are already well into the planning of our future diets – no meat, no fruits from overseas – only locally grown, etc. We could sit here and brainstorm for days and never reach what they’ve already got planned for us. They’ve been thinking about this for years. They won’t stop until we are all walking the big green wheel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRiSnqgVy88
Too Late Pierre.
In Australia the authorities have already regulated hot water.
Under ther guise of not harming children who may scald themselves if they put their hand under the hot tap. Allegedly pushed by emergency department health proffesionals from childrens hospitals.
Other doctors now warn us that the hot water coming out of the tap is not enough to kill e coli or other bacteria when washing the dishes.
Cases of bacteria poisoning and stomach food poisioning have risen alarmingly.
In opther areas the Australian government have mandated ridiculously small water levels to be used in automatic washing machines. The manufacturers know that this low level of water is not enough to clean the clothes properly or remove (kill) all the bacteria.
Next, the Australian government authortities have mandated low level water flush toilet bowls that have been specially designed to “spin” the flushing water around the bowl. Only in Australia therefore the price of a simple toilet bowl is many times the cost of elsewhere.
The legacy of this is that there is not enough water flowing through the sewer pipes to flush them properly.
It may be worse than you think about hot water!
Here in Australia a few months ago a hospital patient died of Legionnaires’ disease and a 2nd very ill.
So what, that not new you say. Well-
“…At 10am, Mr Springborg told State Parliament new guidelines forcing hospitals to lower the temperature of hot water systems to protect patients could have had an impact on the formation of Legionella bacteria in the Wesley Hospital.
Mr Springborg said authorities across the world had lowered the temperature of the water in such facilities in line with safety guidelines.
“Recently, Workplace Health and Safety considerations have required authorities across the world to lower the temperature in hot water systems to protect people from unintended scolds,” he said.
“As a consequence of that it becomes more likely that bacteria can survive in pipes.” ”
To make sure you dont scald yourself you will catch some unintended consequence.
I cant find the best story on this so a rather long one will have to do –
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/hundreds-of-patients-face-anxious-wait-following-rare-legionnaires-outbreak-at-brisbanes-wesley-hospital/story-e6freoof-1226658116104
I get the feeling we are watching the EU swirl around the toilet bowl on their way to the bottom. Hope they don’t depend on Chilean fruit: http://dailycaller.com/2013/10/26/global-warming-chile-hit-with-worst-cold-spell-in-80-years/
Well a Sunday law would fix all of this ! No working on Sundays, and vacuum sales can only be done on say, saturday ! Oh shucks, everything’s only for sake Saturday’s, to make Sundays better !
This WILL fix the problem, permanently.
This story is going viral….showing lots of traffic coming in from Drudge. Never expected this.
It made Drudge. I as a rule pay a lot of attention to foreign press as the American press is just an arm of the Democrat socialist party, so I know just how completely cowed/enslaved you Europeans are by earth worshipers. It sucks to be you.
Don’t crow, Rellik, we’re headed in that direction.
We’d be off world by now if it wernt for these a**holes. You think their castles are energy efficient?
As an American, given what the US and state governments are up to these days, you might not want to be throwing stones.
Have you tried to buy a 100 watt lightbulb lately? How about a high flush toilet?
Look at California to see to see your “earth worshiper” future.
@eristic
The light bulb fiasco is incredibly annoying. I’m hoping that we weren’t as idiotic as we were and that we’ll wake up from that nightmare any day.
Don’t fret about the high flush toilet. With US$5 worth of PVC you can have it back.
Congrats!
Yes Pierre, it’s on Drudge US.
this will have two unintended consequences:
1) people using lower-watt vacs will vacuum for twice as long as before, so there will be no decrease in energy consumption. when the US mandated toilets that used less water, people started flushing multiple times.
2) the value of old vacs will soar, and shops that repair them will see more customers.
3) These European elitists have never picked up a vacuum cleaner in their lives.
Get rid of the carpet floors and can use a broom and dust pan :). Think green
Of course you will lose the insulating benefit of the carpet causing you to need additional energy usage for heating.
Think smart not stupid!
Why are left-wingers always banning shit?
They never ban anything entirely. They only ban the masses from having these things. They themselves never go without it.
Of course. As the old saying goes, “Socialism is for the people, not the Socialists.”
I might be wrong but…. if you have to run the vacuum twice as long, do four loads of wash rather than 3, turn your easy bake oven on for 2 hours rather than 15 minutes, won’t you use more energy? I’d suggest the Euros cut back on immigrants; that would save way more.
My first thought was that it is too ridiculous to be true. But then…
Vaclav Klaus:
“The green movement is trying to dictate, control, regulate, mastermind our lives. This is what we see every day. They want to discuss how many children we can have because the man is a creature which damages the atmosphere because of breathing. They are dictating us what kind of cars we can use, how big the refrigerators we can have. I speak as someone who lived in a communist era and who knows what it means to eliminate freedom, as someone who knows what it means to eliminate the market economy, someone who knows what it means to regulate, to command, to mastermind the economy from above.”
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2008/05/28/vaclav_klaus_on_communism_and_the_ideology_of_environmentalism
But then … Do 7 Billion people each have the right to drive a Hummer??
There’s not enough gasoline on earth to support that so it has to stop somewhere.
Lets hope it doesn’t descend into a food-fight where only the guys with the biggest weapons get access to the resources.
Pedro, that is regulated by supply and demand already. I drive a tiny car because I have better uses for the money. If somebody strikes it rich why shouldn’t he drive a big expensive car?
Can we all at the same time do it? No – it would drive the price of gasoline up to the point where most of us would have to restrict ourselves again.
If you think like a leftist and want equality, then yes, no Hummer for anyone.
If you are a free marketer – then there can be Hummers for those who find it a worthwhile use of their money.
I like the free market world much better. I don’t want a Hummer; I want something else. That’s up to everyone.
Of course the Hummer manufacturer would love to have 7 billion customers, but it would be difficult to supply them all with a vehicle. Now electric cars need to be re-energized every day, and electric production is not pollution friendly. Such a enlarged ability to generate enough for any nation to supply all their transportation needs would add more to pollution than todays few Hummers. All the while such rules like this article is about making live harder for first world citizens, the pollution cuts made in these nations are made up “plus” by shipping these dirty jobs to third would nations by both Europe and the USA, causing unemployment and lower living standards in the west while actually increasing pollution into the atmosphere by putting said jobs in nations that have no pollution controls, and will take any work to establish a economy. Oh, not the armed but the wealthy will still have all the good stuff available, only the serfs will be limited with what the elite’s allow them availability too.
Do 7 billion people need a hummer? Absolutely not. And if you let them buy what they want, only a small portion of them would. Quit worrying so much about what other people do with their money.
Here you’ve hit on a key to the statist mindset: “If I can’t have one, nobody should.” It’s easy to sit around speculating on how others ought to live, or how they should spend their money. You tend to find perfectly useless people who produce nothing of value engaged in this pasttime-become-profession.
Another problem is the woeful state of economic education. Many people don’t understand the notion that the chaos inherent in the market system is a good thing for the whole of its participants over the long run. They see the chaos as a bad thing. These are people who would have forced a standard for consumer-level video recording to Beta, when the market decided VHS.
Somebody above carps about whether we could all drive Hummers. If seven billion people wanted Hummers, the market would eventually find a way to supply them, or the cost would become so prohibitive that they would change their minds. The same would be true of the fuels on which they rely. I have two vehicles. One is an agile car for my commute to work and so on. The other is a large pickup truck for work on my farm. I buy the vehicles that suit my life. I live out in the country on 40 acres. I work in a smallish town M-F. If I were an apartment-dwelling bachelor, I’d certainly drive something else. I don’t have the diesel-gulping F350 because I like burning fuel.
Another basic problem is the narrow-mindedness of most people. They live their lives and seemingly cannot conceive of any other. Because I live out in the country, I am quite literally live at the end of the power lines. Because of this, I wind up popping light-bulbs two times per week at least. If I had to buy compact flourescents each time, I’d go broke or live in darkness after sunset. Being able to buy 100w bulbs before the ban was important to me. It was important enough that I have now a lifetime supply. What this article portends is that I should now stock up on vacuum cleaners, because it’s only a matter of time before the statist Obama administration follows an increasingly communistic Europe.
If we were all mandated to drive the same car, then it would end up being the equivalent of the communist era Trabant, or maybe the Yugo. Equality is only possible in equal misery.
Stupid red herring hysterical straw man arguement.
Not only because Hummers are out of production, but because most of the 7 billion do not know how to drive.
However there is enough oil to refine all that gasoline.
Communists never disappear. They just become environmentalists.
Good luck finding willing export markets for their crummy appliances.
Actually Europeans make very good appliances. I’ll take a Miele appliance over anything out there.
But they are not actually sold in Europe .. their larger appliances are all exported. Like their cars.
Wild Bill, even cheap European appliances survive for 10 years. Try to do that with a GE fridge.
Yes, but will they buy their appliances when they are less effective than their competitors’ products due to home market restrictions?
After it fails in Europe, when consumers uprise against their government regulations, it will come to America with more government control over our lives and less thought in what is decreed by the elite politicans. How can we get rid of these egg heads and replace them with common sense leaders? Elections do not seem to change policies, because the voters keep voting for the same type of representation.
Typical left wing tactics. It’s all about control. The more annoyed you are with the day to day crap you have to put up with the less you will think about the big things like government, freedom, civil liberties and the like. One day though, it will happen, that people will be tired of it, and will yell out the windows, “I’m not going to take it anymore.” Until then, the left wing loonies will keep getting away with more and more control tactics, like healthcare, food, being offended for everyone, vehicles, etc., etc.,…. .
The appliances in Europe are already built for dwarves. I thought I was shopping at a special appliance store for dorm rooms in Helsinki and I find out that is their major department store! My hosts had a normal size house and a refrigerator that could hold about a days worth of food.
Very true – a local “Euro-style” furniture store began importing a line of European kitchen appliances, and failed miserably. The small appliances were well made, but expensive; the only people who would NEED these itty bitty items were those living in cramped “efficiency” dwellings because they couldn’t afford something more spacious – which meant they couldn’t afford expensive European mini-ovens, mini-refrigerators, or mini-dishwashers. People with more money have larger kitchens, and don’t WANT the mini-appliances.
I wonder when they’ll dictate an outright ban cars over say; 70 HP.
(That is, after all, what you need to travel at 100 MPH which should be enough for anyone, right?).
Answer: They won’t because virtually the entire German auto industry relies on the politics of ‘aspiration and envy’ to make people want 150HP+ cars.
So much for environmental politics. The principles go out of the window when you threaten to take the man-toys away.
You are right; these prohibitions just serve to erect barriers to entry for would-be competitors to the established industries.
“So much for environmental politics”
Pedro, the environment is much better than it was just thirty years ago. How much further do you want environmental politics to go; when we’ve all gone back to living in caves and huts?
Why don’t they just ban people? Where does this end with you people?
The is just the foreplay to saving the Earth.
Elite’s who are true believers will move on to the only true way to save the earth from humans.
Kill the non-elite humans by the 100s of Millions at a time and only leave enough non-elite humans on earth to service the robots that will cater to every whim of the elites.
I only hope that the UK will leave the EU. What happens then?
The people of the UK prosper.
Remember when people switched from paper to plastic to save trees? Now back to paper, LOL. Stoopid enviros, just chill trying to save the world, it will be here and look exactly the same way eons after your bones have been re-birthed 20 generations.
How is using a little vac and spending twice as long cleaning
better than using a large vac and spending half the time cleaning ?
Crony socialism. Picking the ONLY winners.
Old Scottish saying.
You can’t teach your granny how to suck eggs.
New EU diktat
Yes, you can.
Gossip has it that a major European electrical manufacturer has patented a method whereby ionized mercury vapour can, when driven into a vortex by low wattage, UV stimulation, attract household dust into bio-safe, disposable pellets that can be disposed of in the same containers as discarded CFL bulbs.
This is just the beginning for the U.K they reduced their coal fired electrical generation capacity.They then went whole hog into solar and wind now they are finding that it was a fools errand.Rolling black outs are just around the corner the ship E.U is sinking.There refusal to use Dirty coal as they like to call it will bring misery to the E.U.
Disgusting. Thankful that I no longer live in Europe, but so sorry for the good people tied there, that they have to live under the increasingly heavy thumb of those small minds in Brussels. May the reign of the utopian statists be short-lived.
The EU has its citizens brain washed by junk science to further the socialist agenda, bigger government more centralized control, and less freedom. The “entitled” masses cannot complain because they are given everything and therefore, must obey. Is it worth the price of your freedom? You people make me sick.
There is NO lower limit to the micromanagement of YOUR life demanded by green progressives.
Naturally, THEY will continue to fly in private jets and ride in limos while YOU are limited to a Soylent Green existence.
When Europe collapses into economic chaos due to those fools in Brussels, I’ll know that America cannot be far behind. Europe is the canary in the coal mine for governmental idiocy.
P. Well, I still have time in Sweden to get a good vacuum to stick in the closet for when ours dies. The other EU Ban that concerns me is the Ban on High End Graphics Cards:
New EU Energy Guidelines Could Cripple High-End Graphics Cards | techPowerUp – Monday, October 15th 2012
One of the biggest consumer electronics markets, EU strictly regulates materials, radio-emissions, and energy-efficiency of consumer electronics items eligible for sale in its member states. A new such energy-efficiency regulation is taking shape that specifically mandates integrated graphics cores and discrete graphics cards to live up to certain energy standards. This has GPU maker AMD worried that it could affect next-generation chips, as they could be barred from sales in the EU.
The EU classifies graphics cards on the basis of on-board memory bandwidth, which is a reliable means of segregating the various market segments. The various classes are tabled below. The top tier “G7” is classified as graphics cards with 128 GB/s or above memory bandwidth. EU wants to cap graphics cards from achieving bandwidths above 320 GB/s (possible with 6.67 GHz at 384-bit width, or 5.00 GHz at 512-bit width). The EU sees memory bandwidth as proportionate to power-consumption. It’s possible that the EU sees today’s hardware more than sufficiently fast to handle games, and every new generation that increases performance does so with increases in power-consumption. With the sheer size of the EU market, GPU makers could be deterred from making low-volume high-performance products for the rest of the world as well.
http://www.techpowerup.com/173706/new-eu-energy-guidelines-could-cripple-high-end-graphics-cards.html
Now this is really interesting – as GPU’s these days are used for number crunching. This could make it impossible for the EU to compete in cutting edge AI. No power toys for the kids – no prodigies.
Related: China just lifted their game console ban – which they had for 10 years or so. Now I expect them to come on the market with their own console.
EU is still beating that Climate change dead horse, that al gore mad millions from. What it really is about is. It’s about Population Control.
It used to be that nothing sucked like an Electrolux.
Now it’s Brussels.
That’s just because “lux” rhymes with “sucks” 🙂
The European economy is on pins and needles and these idiots are worried about vacuum cleaners. To make matters even sillier most of the vacuums alread conform! Sheesh. When will the Euros wake up and boot these idiots out.
So you think EU regulations effective?
Costly maybe.
But I posted this below on WUWT a few hours ago. See what you think.
Kindest Regards
——————————————–
a jones says:
October 27, 2013 at 8:22 pm
Herewith a cautionary tale about greenie weenie legislation.
A while ago I met an old friend and ex colleague for a rather grand not to say bibulous lunch at a very smart London venue which he paid for.
He seemed very prosperous which surprised me since he is the business of making and supplying incandescent light bulbs. Which I imagined would have been hard hit by the EU legislation banning them.
Quite the contrary. Apparently the supermarkets had taken over the business for common or garden incandescents, 100 watts and the like, supplied in packs of four or six many years ago. These used to come from Eastern European manufacturers at very cheap prices and later were imported under various brand names from India, China etc. which put many EU makers out of business.
This trade has ceased since the import of such to the EU is now banned. And the supermarkets have stopped supplying them.
Moreover my friend could not compete and so did not make such items, he specialised in rarer designs which sold through wholesalers to small retail outlets.
But now the world is upside down, he imports these standard 100 watt and the like from Poland, part of the EU, and repackages them for the UK market supplying wholesalers who in turn supply small retailers. And in very considerable amounts.
How so? well the EU directive does not apply to rough service bulbs so they are sold as such. When i queried that he chortled and assured me that the bulb was exactly the same one I could have bought before, the difference was each bulb was packaged in a glossy little carton which said it was ‘Rough Service’ but otherwise there was no difference except that he added a few pennies on the price as no doubt did the wholesalers and retailers. And said business had never been so good.
I was amazed. Prior to the ban i had bought up stocks of 100 watts etc, and haven’t needed to buy since.
So I hied me down to my local ironmonger, you call it a hardware store, where they keep all sorts of things including light bulbs. And inquired of the owner, an old friend, who in response showed me racks and racks of incandescent bulbs of every shape and size, every one in a little glossy carton quoting its EU number and ratings and displaying the notice ‘Rough Service’. Can’t get enough of them it seems.
So as my old schoolmaster used to say, read, learn and inwardly digest.
Kindest Regards
Okay, so we buy an appliance that uses one half the energy of a larger one. Unfortunately it takes you three times as long to do the job.
It’s not the amount of energy a product consumes to operate. It’s the amount of energy that is consumed to get the same job done. In some cases, the larger vacuum may be more efficient.
It’s like banning tractor trailer rigs because they consume too much fuel. Nothing larger than a pickup truck allowed, because a pickup gets 20 miles per gallon while the semi rig gets four mpg.
The fallacy in that kind of thinking is that it will take ten or more pickup trucks to do the work of one tractor trailer rig. The fleet of pickup trucks it will take to replace the semi rig will burn three or four times more fuel to do the same work.
/Sarc on
I wonder if this directive is written for SIEMENS or BOSH.
/Sarc off
Well, the bottom line is this is socialism. It’s dictatorship and brainless beyond belief, yet there it is. Most of the nations involved with the EU are quite socialist. It’s no surprise that the EU is as well. Just another dictatorship and with Europe ripe with dictatorial history and the fallout to show for it. One would think that at some point they’d learn from their own history, but that just doesn’t seem to be the case. They’d rather be lied to and lead about by the nose like cattle.
There is one other way to look at this. If they really are so ignorant and mere willing sheep maybe they really do need someone else how to run their lives for them. With all the innovative idea for generating and supplying more power in many forms one would think that would be the growth direction. I wonder how long it will take them to figure out that as long as population grows there will always be a need for more energy? When they do figure it out I have no doubt that they’ll simply deal with it by way of infanticide and geronticide. The answers of the final solution crowd.
Mr. Campbell; Eugenics was invented by the cousin of Charles Darwin; Francis Galton, and endorsed by such Anglo-Saxon luminaries as Woodrow Wilson, George Bernard Shaw and John Maynard Keynes, a relative of the Darwin clan. Shall I go on to discuss the history of M Sanger and forced sterilisations in the US?
The implication of the story is that this is beyond the fringe and that it would never happen here (in the US). While this particular reg may not be a reality, yet, there are many similar examples; it’s a comm’n. Also, many cities are also in this biz, of limiting your footprint.
All the extra exercise you get from using the under-powered vacumn cleaner will keep you nice and warm.
Of course they are designing ‘smart-meters’ that might be able to turn down your heating while you use the vacumn-cleaner….It’s going to be like that Luc Besson movie “The Fifth Element”.
HERE is the entire torture arsenal
http://www.eup-network.de/product-groups/overview-ecodesign/
“After a product group has been selected and listed in the working plan, the next steps to obligatory regulations are as follows:
1.Compiling background data in preparatory study
2.Working Document drafted by the European Commission, discussion in the Consultation Forum; depending on the development of the discussions, draft documents can be revised several times (only the most recent version is linked below)
3.Draft Implementing Measure (voted by the Regulatory Committee)
4.The draft regulation is sent to the EU-Parliament for scrutiny
5.Mandatory regulation – published in the Official Journal of the European Union”
More about the EU’s ecodesign directive.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Ecodesign_Directive
“The implementing measures focus on those products which have a high potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions at low cost, through reduced energy demand.”
Well, at least that is the pretense.
[…] More here. H/T: Fjordman […]
Just as the “peace movement” was run by communists, so is the “green movement”.
In the U.S. we now have “smart meters” on our homes. They can see our energy usage at any moment. With the Hyde Park leftists in the White House now, expect any type and amount of control over free market capitalism.
The requirements for computers that are sold from 01. July 2014 onwards in the EU. This directive also contains the upper limits for GPU’s.
http://www.eup-network.de/fileadmin/user_upload/REG_617-2013_Computers.pdf
To me it looks like this directive is in force in all EU member states.
The document does not seem to contain commandments about how many devices one prole may own or use. I did not read every word, though.
Civil disobedience is now the way forward.
Apparently “alternative” energy methods are not sufficient to meet demand and the response is to forcibly reduce demand by attacking lifestyle choices.