Energy consumption and saving potentials
Relevance
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 The total number of household cold appliances in the European Union (EU-25) is an estimated 260 million, and according to GfK-data from 21 European countries, more than 18 million refrigerators and freezers were sold in 2004 (Faberi, 2007). The energy demand during the use phase is responsible for more than 75% of all environmental impacts during a refrigerator’s life cycle (Rüdenauer, Gensch, 2005). Of the total energy consumption of large appliances in households, refrigerators and freezers still have to be accounted for the larger share (40%) (Odyssee, 2007). The total energy consumption of the refrigerator and freezer stock in the EU-25 in 2005 is estimated at 106 billion kWh per year (Faberi, 2007) – the production of about 10 nuclear power plants. |
Energy consumption
 Energy consumption of household refrigerating appliances can differ vastly – depending on product category, but especially over different energy efficiency categories. While an average A++ cold appliance uses 120 kWh a year, a comparable appliance of energy class B consumes with 300 kWh per year 2.5 times as much energy. The energy consumption of an average class C device is even three times higher than that of an A++-refrigerator: 600 kWh per year. Hardly visible to today’s consumers is that even within the A-categories there is a relevant difference in energy consumption. A++ appliances still consume 30% less energy than A+-labelled appliances, and 45% less than A-labelled ones.
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Saving potentials
 If the average energy efficiency label of the 18 million cold appliances which are newly installed each year today is an A, these new appliances approximately use 3.9 billion kWh a year. If only A++ appliances were sold, energy consumption of these newly sold household refrigerators and freezers would be half as much: about 2.1 billion kWh per year. As soon as all older cold appliances in households were replaced by A++-appliances (after about 15 years), their energy consumption would be about 60% lower than today: each year 60 billion kWh, the production of about 6 nuclear power plants, could be saved.
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