Understand everything about the new European regulation “ESPR” on ecodesign

The ESPR, “Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation”, is the new European regulation on the ecodesign of sustainable products. It was adopted by Parliament on 25 April 2024.

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Its objective? Strengthen the circularity of our products and thus make them more sustainable from an environmental point of view.

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With the ESPR, the Commission is stepping up a gear and setting new ecodesign requirements for businesses and extending them to almost all products on the European market! In concrete terms, products marketed within the European Union will have to meet new requirements in terms of performance and information.

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But what are the new requirements that businesses are going to have? What products are affected by these obligations? What is the planned schedule? What is the digital passport that businesses will have to put in place? All of these questions and more are answered in this article.

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What are the new ESPR regulations?

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ESPR: a new European Union-wide approach to ecodesign and sustainability

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It is, in a way, the cornerstone of the Commission's approach to more sustainable and circular products. It is also a key element in the implementation of the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP) provided for by the European Union Green Deal.

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The objective of the ESPR is simple: to establish a framework for setting a wide range of ecodesign requirements and thus improve the circularity and environmental performance of products on the European market by making them more sustainable.

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But besides, what is ecodesign? According to ADEME (the Agency for the Environment and Energy Management), it is a question of “designing a range of products that are more environmentally friendly”.

We say that a good or service offered by a company is “eco-designed” when, from the initial design phase, the company seeks to:

- minimize the negative impacts of this product on the environment

- integrate measures to preserve the environment.

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Ecodesign covers the entire product life cycle!

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Ecodesign has a proven track record in terms of benefits for businesses, consumers and the environment. According to the European Commission, in 2021 alone, current ecodesign measures would have saved 120 billion euros in energy expenditure for EU consumers and reduced the annual energy consumption of the products concerned by 10%! With this new text, the savings will be even higher.

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Framework legislation for ecodesign at European Union level

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It is important to understand that the ESPR regulation is framework legislation, which means that this regulation outlines a regulatory framework within which future measures will be taken later. The adoption of this text is therefore the starting point for a long legislative journey to come.

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Concretely, the ESPR regulation sets out the main guiding principles of the text, the timetable, the establishment of an Ecodesign Forum, regulates the working sessions, provides for multi-annual work, organizes product impact analyses that will lead to the future adoption of specific measures and defines priorities.

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However, the regulation does not set specific, specific and concrete measures, but because of its existence, it allows for their subsequent adoption! Thus, all the details of the new requirements in terms of ecodesign or information disclosure (thresholds, durations, products concerned, etc.) will be specified later and will apply to companies after the adoption of delegated acts or implementing acts, the two types of instruments implementing Union law.

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Finally, it is a regulation, which means that it is directly applicable to Member States as soon as it enters into force, unlike European directives which must be transposed at national level by each Member State.

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What products are affected?

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While the current eco-design directive only covers energy-related products (31 groups of products related to lighting, heating, air conditioning, etc.), the ESPR regulation goes beyond the purely energy component and extends to a much wider range of products.

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Indeed, the rules proposed under the ESPR will apply to almost all categories of physical goods placed on the European Union market (with the exception in particular of foodstuffs for humans and animals), whether they are produced inside or outside the European Union.

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What are the main contributions of the ESPR in relation to the current ecodesign directive?

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The content of the ESPR regulation is based on the current directive 2009/125/EC on ecodesign and will eventually replace it.

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The main changes brought about by the ESPR regulation are the following:

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• The scope of application of the text is much wider ! As we saw above, almost all products on the European market are affected.

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• New sustainability and eco-design criteria are integrated in the text. Indeed, among the requirements related to product performance, new criteria are added such as sustainability, the CO2e footprint, the share of recycled content in this or that product, etc.

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• Horizontality. The regulation provides for the establishment of “horizontal” measures and common ecodesign performance or information requirements for products or product groups that have similarities.

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• The ESPR provides for product information obligations. New concrete information measures are integrated into the regulation, such as the establishment of a digital product passport, for example.

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These contributions would make it possible to achieve numerous savings. According to the European Commission, by 2030, the new framework for sustainable products can save 132 million tons of primary energy (which corresponds to about 150 billion cubic meters of natural gas, almost the equivalent of Russian gas imports from the European Union.)

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The new ecodesign requirements for businesses are detailed below.

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What are the new ecodesign requirements provided for by the ESPR?

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The ESPR defines new eco-design requirements for products. Ecodesign requirements can relate to a specific product or apply horizontally to a set of products.

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These requirements are both linked to product performance criteria (qualitative and quantitative) but also to the information available about the product in question.

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Among these new ecodesign requirements, there are:

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• Product sustainability, reuse, improvement and repairability: the objective is to reduce the need to replace products by maximizing their lifespan and to make their repair and maintenance possible. The design must be able to allow the products to be used as long as possible and that they can be easily dismantled and repaired, which means that the necessary parts must be accessible and known.

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• Controlling the presence of substances that hinder circularity: companies that manufacture products must ensure that they exclude or drastically limit the use of materials or substances that are harmful and/or hinder the circularity of the product (substance that makes recycling impossible, for example).

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• Energy efficiency and resource efficiency: energy consumption and the use of resources (water, etc.) must be optimized during the product design phase, and throughout the product life cycle.

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• Recycled content: when manufacturing and designing products, companies will have to integrate a minimum threshold of recycled materials. Once again, the aim is to save resources and promote the circularity of products.

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• Refabrication and recycling: the components used and the manufacturing processes must make the dismantling and separation of components as simple as possible. Thus, it facilitates remanufacturing and recycling since the materials can be recovered and reused.

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• The carbon and environmental footprint: manufacturers must reduce the carbon footprint of their products as much as possible and limit their greenhouse gas emissions by carefully choosing their materials, manufacturing processes, logistics, etc.

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• Information requirements, including the creation of a digital product passport to inform consumers and users: businesses must provide detailed and accessible information about their products (sustainability, repairability, proportion of recycled materials, etc.). This means that they must communicate this information digitally through a “Digital Product Passport”.

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FOCUS on the flagship measure: the DPP “Digital Product Passport”

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The DPP “Digital Product Passport” or “Digital Product Passport” is the new information obligation imposed by the ESPR which falls on companies putting products on the European market. With the DPP, the European Commission sets ecodesign requirements for access to data for products, in addition to physical ecodesign requirements.

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In concrete terms, the DPP will make it mandatory at European level to display information on the environmental sustainability of products. The objective is thus to facilitate repairs and recycling, to improve the transparency of the impacts of the life cycle of products on the environment but also to promote products with the best environmental performance since this tool should help consumers and businesses to make informed choices when buying.

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The DPP will simplify digital access to this information since it will suffice for the consumer or user to scan a data carrier to know the different attributes of a product in terms of sustainability, repairability, recycled content, recycled content, availability of spare parts. The passport produced should also help public authorities to better carry out checks and controls.

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In concrete terms, manufacturers will have to ensure that:

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• a product passport exists and that it complies with the requirements of the European Commission
• the product passport is complete, that is, it contains all the mandatory information according to the product category to which it belongs
• the information in the passport is authentic, reliable and verified
• a backup copy of the DPP is maintained by a certified third party product passport service provider
• a copy of the passport is made available to distributors and online marketplaces that sell the product in question.

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DPP vs environmental labelling: what is the link?

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The DPP is very similar to the environmental labelling provided for at the French level by the AGEC law (anti-waste law for a circular economy), a pioneer in environmental labelling for textiles. How are these two fairly similar standards going to be articulated?

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The ESPR makes it possible to define and establish common norms and standards at the level of the European Union. The ESPR regulation will enhance French-style environmental labelling since it will apply to many additional sectors.

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The ESPR regulates the destruction of unsold consumer goods

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The ESPR text sets out a general principle of preventing the destruction of unsold products. The aim is for businesses to take steps to avoid destroying unsold products.

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Why? Because this practice is widespread. Although precise figures are rare, the European Commission considers that:

• In the EU, 4 to 9% of textiles placed on the market are destroyed before use, i.e. between 264,000 and 594,000 tonnes of textiles destroyed each year.
• In France, the destruction of unsold items would represent a loss of 630-800 million euros per year.

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Concretely, the ESPR regulation:

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• imposes transparency requirements for businesses that dispose of unsold products and requires them to disclose the following information on their website: number and weight per year, reasons for the destruction, the relevant exemption, the measures taken to avoid destruction etc.

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• plans to prohibit the destruction of the product groups concerned, in particular textiles and shoes, within 2 years of the entry into force of the ESPR regulation. Some derogations may be granted later if necessary in view of the situation.

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• provides for the Commission to adopt implementing acts setting out the details and format of disclosure: delimitation of product types or categories, procedures for verifying the information disclosed. The adoption of the implementing act is expected within 12 months following the date of entry into force of the ESPR Regulation.

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• exempt micro and small businesses.

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Implementation schedule and next steps

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The next steps are as follows:

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• Step 1: The European Commission sets up multi-annual work plans and carries out detailed preparatory studies and impact assessments.

• Step 2: The European Commission consults the analyses and measures at the Eco-design Forum.

• Step 3: Adoption of the first measures, scheduled for 2026.
• Step 4: Implementation of the measures, at least 18 months after their adoption, which means that the specific obligations will apply to products from 2027. Shorter implementation periods may apply to some products.

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The timetable provided by the European Commission is as follows:

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In the meantime and until the new measures are fully implemented, the current Directive 2009/125/EC on eco-design will continue to apply.

Conclusion

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In addition to eco-design requirements, the digital product passport, the case of substances of concern or unsold goods, the ESPR text enshrines other essential elements and principles such as the establishment of market surveillance mechanisms and customs controls for regulated products, the principle of self-regulation etc.

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In addition, this ESPR text, which impacts the way our products are produced, will directly concern all manufacturers, even foreign ones. To do this, the EU will have to ensure an open dialogue with producer countries in order to improve the sustainability of their products. The Commission has also indicated that it will carefully assess the possible impact of these new obligations on third countries.

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