The European Commission is seeking to improve the battery life and availability of spare parts for cell phones and tablets. In draft proposals published this week, European regulators are planning to force cell phone manufacturers to provide professional repairers with at least 15 different parts within five years of a device first going on sale. Consumers will also be able to get a five-year EU-wide guarantee on replacement batteries, displays, chargers, back covers and even SIM/memory card trays.
The draft proposal aims to improve the serviceability of smartphones and tablets and reduce their carbon footprint in Europe and push manufacturers to make it more durable and easier to repair products, should reduce e-waste, increase recycling rates and reuse the materials needed to manufacture the devices.
If these recommendations are adopted across Europe later this year, new energy labels on smartphones and tablets will also be introduced, acting much like those on TVs and white goods across Europe. The energy labels will show the likely battery life of the phone or tablet and also include information on the device’s protection against water and dust, and even rate the phone’s resistance to accidental drops, proposals that follow mandatory rules similar to those implemented in the EU for USB-C chargers.
Under the EU’s plan, manufacturers will have to meet a series of battery durability tests if they can’t offer battery replacements to consumers within five years. These tests would ensure that devices retain 80 percent of their rated capacity after 1,000 full charge cycles. Manufacturers will also need to ensure that software updates do not negatively impact battery life.
However, these regulations do not apply to phones or tablets with flexible primary displays, models that “can be unfolded and partially or fully rolled up by the user,” or smartphones designed for high-security environments. In any case, these new regulations will certainly improve the battery life and serviceability of smartphones, especially for budget or low-cost devices.
The draft regulation comes after the European Parliament proposed earlier this year to make it mandatory to provide universal chargers for cell phones and other devices. The European Parliament claimed at the time that unused and discarded chargers added about 11,000 metric tons of electronic waste in Europe each year.
While the draft proposals attempt to address serviceability and improve reliability, the Environmental Standards Coalition (ECOS) believes they do not go far enough.ECOS said, “While generally encouraging, the proposals should still be significantly improved. The availability and replaceability of certain spare parts place unnecessary restrictions on do-it-yourself repairers.”
ECOS, an international NGO advocating environmental standards, also wants manufacturers to have to offer durable batteries and spare parts as standard, rather than being able to choose between the two. eCOS believes that “consumers should get at least both, not just one or the other, as is currently proposed.”
