CEA, Panasonic, Sharp Again Seek Implementation Delay in Energy Star 7.0 TV Spec

Sharp Labs joined CEA in urging the three-month delay, in its comments, and Panasonic went the extra step of calling for a five-month delay to Feb. 29, 2016. Doing so “will better accommodate the introduction of the 2016 models,” Panasonic said. “At the same time, it will allow the 2015 models certified to Version 6.1 to be continued to be manufactured until the introduction of the 2016 models.” Panasonic, like CEA and Sharp, also wants a three-month deadline extension to Aug. 15 when certification bodies should be instructed to stop certifying new product submittals to Version 6.1, Panasonic said.

Absent a delay in Version 7.0's Sept. 30 effective date, CEA member companies “are in agreement that it will be extremely difficult” for most of the TVs manufactured for sale throughout 2015 to qualify for Version 7.0 “without having to recertify mid-year after making further changes to their products,” CEA said. “Similarly, it would also likely cause many Version 6.1 qualified products to be delisted mid-year.”

CEA again said the introduction of new TVs to the commercial market “naturally occurs between the Super Bowl in February and the end of September,” when retail space for the holiday selling season “is negotiated and finalized,” CEA said. Since the Sept. 30 effective date falls within that “cycle,” its “anticipated timing” couldn’t come “at a more inopportune time for manufacturers,” CEA said.

Panasonic fears it’s “unrealistic” to assume that many of the 2015 models that already are designed and tested “will be able to meet the robust Version 7.0 specification without significant redesign,” it told the agency. “Therefore, the only choice for the majority of these models will be to certify to Version 6.1 prior to the beginning of their manufacture starting now in many cases,” and then losing that certification when Version 7.0 takes effect Sept. 30, as the EPA wants it to, Panasonic said. “This will cause major market disruption since all stakeholders do not want to see the same model with and without ENERGY STAR certification. The net result may be the premature end of manufacture of many 2015 models and perhaps even a shortage of ENERGY STAR certified televisions.”

Sharp agrees with CEA that if the Sept. 30 effective date stands, “it will be extremely difficult for the majority of the 2015 model line to qualify” for Version 7.0 “without having to recertify and potentially make expensive running changes to the products,” it told the EPA. “It would also likely cause many 2015 v6.1 qualified products to be delisted mid-year, which would result in expensive running changes to remove Energy Star logos from various materials and firmware.”

Ultra HD TVs with 2160 lines of vertical resolution will qualify for Energy Star certification under an "allowance" that lets them consume up to 50 percent more incremental power than comparably sized and featured 1080p sets and still be deemed Energy Star-compliant, the EPA said in its final draft of the Version 7.0 Energy Star TV specification released Dec. 3 (see 1412040035). The finding dealt somewhat of a blow to CEA and some of its member companies, which had pushed the EPA to grant a 75 percent incremental power allowance on Ultra HD sets. However, the EPA, which had proposed having that allowance expire in May 2017, did heed CEA’s call to scrap that expiration date.

Green groups, in their final round of comments, urged the agency to reconsider doing away with the expiration date. The Appliance Standards Awareness Project (ASAP) and the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), despite their “overall support” for the final draft, fear that scrapping the expiration date for the Ultra HD allowance “removes a date certain" that would have helped the EPA and stakeholders better gauge the energy consumption of Ultra HD TVs, they said in joint comments. “Numerous UHD TV models, from major manufacturers, already meet the allowance and several models are very close to meeting the allowance.”

Lacking an expiration date could quickly render Version 7.0 “meaningless” if there’s a “rapid influx” of Ultra HD TVs that meet the allowance and qualify for Energy Star, ASAP and ACEEE said. “Because of this, we continue to urge EPA to include an expiration date for the UHD allowance.” They want the allowance to expire Dec. 31, 2016, they said. That would be five months earlier than the EPA had previously stipulated, but seven months later than the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) had proposed.

If the EPA won’t reinstate the expiration date, that puts the onus on “the timely development” of the next-gen Version 8.0 spec, ASAP and ACEEE said. They take the EPA on its word that the agency will monitor the market closely and adjust the Ultra HD allowance if needed, they said. “We strongly encourage EPA to do this and believe that given past market shifts in this product category, EPA should plan toward an effective date no later than January 1, 2018, for version 8 and schedule a version 7 specification revision launch accordingly.”

The Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships likewise fears that the “rapid uptake” of Ultra HD will mean that if there’s no expiration date for the allowance, “we could arise at a situation where there is little incentive to drive energy for UHD down over multiple product cycles,” the group told the EPA. It also could well mean that when the EPA begins the process of developing Version 8.0, “we may not have sufficient understanding of what the efficiency capabilities are for UHD televisions,” it said. It proposed reinstating an expiration date, and suggested it should be Dec. 31, 2016, or whenever Version 8 development begins, whichever comes first. Without such a deadline in place, it could mean that Version 8.0 as an Energy Star spec “may not be as strong as possible,” it said.

The NRDC in its final round of comments stopped short of joining the other green groups in urging the EPA to reinstate the expiration date. But “at a minimum,” it wants the agency to develop “a specific and transparent mechanism to track and publicly report the market share” of Ultra HD models that qualify for Energy Star Version 7.0, NRDC said. If that analysis finds in 2015 or early 2016 that half the TV models on the market that qualify for Energy Star Version 7.0 are Ultra HD sets and they landed that qualification under the 50 percent allowance, the EPA should “commit” to updating Version 7.0 and putting that update into effect within six months of such a finding, it said. Doing so would enable the EPA to modify Version 7.0 with a 7.1 update, if needed, rather than waiting for a Version 8.0 to take effect late 2017 or early 2018, it said.

The NRDC also again voiced its concerns about the growing prevalence of user-selectable “quick start” functionality on smart TVs, saying “some implementations” of quick start use as much as 24 extra watts of power for up to 19 hours daily. “At these levels, annual energy use for a TV model could more than double for some TVs.” Though the Department of Energy TV test procedure and Energy Star requirements “will capture the incremental power” use from quick start if that option is selected during initial TV set up, the DOE test method won’t capture it if the quick start option is activated later, it said. In such cases, a TV marketed as Energy Star-compliant “may in reality use a lot more energy than non-qualified models.”

Though the EPA did not adopt NRDC’s original proposal to require TV makers to report the power use and reboot time of the quick start option when activated after the TV’s initial set up, the NRDC now wants the agency “as a compromise” to “simply add a mandatory Y/N field to its reporting template for manufacturers to identify whether or not their model includes a post set up Quick Start option,” it said. “This is a very simple declaration to make.” Doing so will glean information that “will prove very useful” in developing Version 8.0, it said. “By knowing which models have this feature, EPA can perform some testing of representative models to better understand the power use of this feature and its prevalence.”