EU to ban patio heaters

bubonicus

EU threatens to ban patio heaters
Valerie Elliott, Consumer Editor

Britain’s growing café culture and taste for alfresco drinking and dining may be under threat from MEPs who want to ban the patio heater.

A vote in Brussels today is expected to call on the European Commission to abolish the heaters to help to tackle climate change. Such a move could cost the pub and catering trade dear.

Pubs spent about £85 million on patio heaters after the smoking ban was introduced last year. Besides forcing smokers into the cold there is concern that a ban on patio heaters could bring a significant cash loss to pubs, cafés and restaurants.

The hospitality industry has estimated that if only 10 per cent of Britain’s pubs offered outdoor facilities a ban could cost £250 million a year, or as much as £45,000 a year for a single business.

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The Heat is Off
Experts claim that patio heaters are being singled out unfairly and that their impact on global warming is minimal. Eric Johnson, national expert reviewer for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, said that televisions emitted more carbon dioxide. Using government figures, he said that patio heaters accounted for 22,200 tonnes of CO2 , 0.002 per cent of total emissions in Britain.

Televisions produce 4.6 million tonnes of CO2 a year and Dr Johnson claims that it would take more than five patio heaters to produce as much CO2 as one television on standby mode over a year. He said: “The overall impact of outdoor heaters . . . is minimal, and once you look at the domestic models used in homes, the impact is almost nonexistent.”

Patio heaters can be fuelled by electricity, natural gas or liquefied petroleum gas. His views were part of research commissioned by Calor, the largest supplier of LPG.

Fiona Hall, Liberal Democrat MEP for the North East, is trying to persuade the European Parliament to accept a European ban on patio heaters and all standby controls on electrical appliances. A Commission spokeswoman said yesterday that if MEPs voted for a ban it would be scrutinised.

B&Q, Wyedale and Notcutts, the garden centre chains, have already announced that they will stop selling patio heaters once stocks run out because of their damage to the environment. A spokeswoman for the Horticultural Trades Association said that garden centres were looking at promoting greener alternatives.

The Energy Savings Trust also suports a ban on patio heaters. Philip Sellwood, chief executive of the trust, said it was not good enough to wait for the rest of Europe.

“We need UK action now. That is why we are calling on responsible retailers to follow Wyevale and B&Q’s lead and stop selling patio heaters, and for restaurant and pub chains to reconsider the widespread use of these products. Consumers also have a role to play. We know that a third of pubgoers are choosing pubs where there is a patio heater, but why not just wrap up warm instead if you need to go outside?”

It is concerned by figures compiled by Green Barometer, an index that tracks public opinion on the environment, which suggest that the number of patio heaters in the country will double to at least 2.3 million within two years. Some 10 per cent of households, about 2.5 million, said that they already had or would buy a patio heater in the near future.

The trust said that 2.3 million heaters would emit the same CO2 in a year as driving from Land’s End to John o’ Groats 200,000 times.

There was little enthusiasm for a ban at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/envi...icle3279948.ece

:eek:

mike65

Would do better to ban "stand-by" facility on electrical items were at all possible.

Mike.

Lennoxschips

Have to agree that heating the outdoors is a wasteful exercise.

Capt'n Midnight

mike65 wrote:

Would do better to ban "stand-by" facility on electrical items were at all possible.

Mike.

The concept of standby is OK.
The implementation is not.
Digital watches that run for years on a tiny battery and solar powered calculators that run indoors have been around for decades. Mosfet's and SCR's with extremely low leakage currents have been around for ages too. So it should be trivial to make an electronic device which can have an almost zero power state.

How much power do the remote control power plugs take ?

In the UK all mains sockets must have switches by law. Change the law here and it would mean you could just switch off at the wall instead of putting wear and tear on the cable by unplugging, which just has to be dangerous based on the number of dodgy plugs I've seen.

It would be better to have better approvals - there is one for devices of less than 1W , lets start there and work down.

Lennoxschips

Lennoxschips wrote: »

Have to agree that heating the outdoors is a wasteful exercise.

I was in Pakistan a few years ago, in late November it can get quite cool at night (chilly to the locals). I saw several security guards standing in their guard huts each with a two bar electric fire at their feet!

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

The concept of standby is OK.
The implementation is not.
Digital watches that run for years on a tiny battery and solar powered calculators that run indoors have been around for decades. Mosfet's and SCR's with extremely low leakage currents have been around for ages too. So it should be trivial to make an electronic device which can have an almost zero power state.

The standby system should run from a small rechargable battery so the mains power to the appliance can be completely shutdown, rather than wasting energy ticking over. The battery being recharged while the appliance is live. Some of the earliest remote controlled TV's had a solenoid that mechanically pushed the off switch.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

In the UK all mains sockets must have switches by law. Change the law here and it would mean you could just switch off at the wall instead of putting wear and tear on the cable by unplugging, which just has to be dangerous based on the number of dodgy plugs I've seen.

Another way of looking at this would be to have all the devices connected to a socket gang that is switchable from a convenient location, rather than crawling behind the TV every night.
But the zero power standby is better, it should be manditory on all appliences that offer a standby option.

Run_to_da_hills

It would save on heating if each pub handed out "donkey jackets", with a deposit paid for those that wanted to go out for a fag.

Don't you mean "smoking jackets"

djpbarry

Deleted User wrote: »

The standby system should run from a small rechargable battery so the mains power to the appliance can be completely shutdown, rather than wasting energy ticking over. The battery being recharged while the appliance is live.

Is that not exactly the same thing? Standby mode would still be using power, no?

Deleted User wrote: »

Some of the earliest remote controlled TV's had a solenoid that mechanically pushed the off switch.

Yes, I remember that - interesting idea. Probably not "sexy" enough for today's consumers.

djpbarry

djpbarry wrote: »

Is that not exactly the same thing? Standby mode would still be using power, no?
.

True, but less power would be lost driving the power supply as it would be disconnected while the appliance is on "standby".