Europeans get ‘right to repair’ for some electrical goods
independent.co.uk
independent.co.uk
However, as someone who likes to repair electronics, so often when I open something up it's clear that it was designed to be unrepairable. Impossible to open without breaking something, unnecessary glue everywhere, and so on. It's time this was recognized as the ecological disaster that it is and made illegal. Even a poorly implemented law is a step in the right direction here.
And before someone chimes in - it is possible to create small, thin, lightweight electronics and still have them be repairable. However, this law will also apply to bigger machinery like farming equipment, fridges, cars, and so on.
This was posted a few days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26279350
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/mar/03/fitbit-se...
For instance, iPhones are terrible to repair yet come up with 6/10 score. A user would think it's not that bad. But it is that bad, 6/10 in evaluation should be 0/10 for end-users information (only >9/10 should be considered any good).
Also, in my view it should be a criminal offense and a crime against nature/humanity to build a product that's explicitly designed not to be repairable. But well, we're not quite there yet.
Negligence is in my view not the same as hostility.
Also, Bitcoin is only a problem because our worldwide economic system is so fucked up noone can trust a government/bank with their money. We need to fix the actual problem (not the symptom), either by getting rid of money entirely, or by building a fair economic system.
Though that e-euro does sound promising, I guess we will see.
Smaller machines make smaller waste (even tho they might sometimes create more dangerous waste e.g. phone batteries.)
In another few years most vehicles will be battery powered too, with much bigger batteries.
we live in a world where anything from a phone to big screen tv can be made anywhere in the world and sold anywhere else. a lot of that comes from reducing manufacturing to as few components as possible leaving only large assemblies as being replaceable. Now these laws need to leave open the ability to use 3rd party replacement parts and re manufactured parts
Let us look at our phones. Even if the case could be opened easily you have at most four to five truly discreet components that could fail and be replaced. Front glass, rear panel, circuit board, battery, and ?. I would love to see failure rates of each component, just want are companies fixing under warranty? Having that published would be very valuable.
Now I took our phones as an example but even laptops are not that far off. Being able to repair is not the same as being able to upgrade and many want the later. However that could put you straight outside of any warranty in the first place. So playing with a modern day no moving parts except at most a fan you have the system case, display panel, battery, and logic board. Even if a manufacturer made it so you could replace memory and drive it could all be limited to only the capacities they sell for that sku. hell they could use non standard connectors internally to thwart it and ease manufacturing.
as for appliances and big ticket house hold items from stoves, refrigerators, to TVs what do we get? what breaks in appliances? burners, circuit boards, compressors, pumps, and such.
note : I work in the automotive parts industry and the right to repair vehicles is very important to us and others. I truly believe the laws are needed but I think people's expectations of what can be repaired in the realm of small electronics is unrealistic as many items are outside of the case four or five discreet assemblies
The EU also has a law to require standard charging cables in the works. They could expand that to include other components.
> Front glass, rear panel, circuit board, battery, and ?.
In my experience, the part that breaks first through normal wear and tear is the charging port. The part that breaks the most overall is the screen, but that's by being dropped.
Intrested in how this will develop!
Most of the "active" parts and fittings are repairable with effort, even if manuals and parts are not easy to get.
However in all modern fridges I have looked at, the structure is folded sheet metal which is not designed to be taken apart. Certain key panels cannot be opened out without distortion that will affect the fit. Inside the voids there is polystyrene (or similar) insulation.
Eventually that insulation gets stinky and moldy and that is pretty much the end of the fridge because the insulation is inaccessible and cannot be replaced. You can try hitting it through vents, with bleach, but you cannot get it back to "as new". This kind of non-mechanical failure eventually renders the fridge un-usable for food.
It seems like it would take an entirely different design to anything I have seen on the market to create a true "50 year fridge".
It all started with the Phoebus cartel in the 1920's and what we nowadays called "planned obsolescence" is a worldwide strategy by the industry.
A fridge is capable of lasting way more than 15 years. Many people use fridges or washing machines that are over 50 years. Anything that's not built to be repairable and last decades is just harmful to users and the environment. For example IoT is really something that should never exist.
For example, it will without any doubt take more energy/ressources to build a Raspberry Pi than to keep your old desktop computer powered.
However, from an economic perspective the opposite is true because as consumers we pay energy far greater prices than the industry does. Which means i can buy a raspberry pi for the price in electricity that my desktop would consume in a few years. That device will then use a lot less energy to run, but took so much to produce it's meaningless.
That is, without even taking into consideration recycling concerns. Recycling for electronics mostly doesn't exist (see open-air landfills with children taking metals apart using dangerous chemicals), and in any case also requires energy/resources and produces pollution.
We are economically incentivized to destroy the planet. All those "buy a new car" programs are not meant to save the planet, they're meant to save big corp profits by keeping everyone buying new stuff. That's what is really worrying in my view.
The implicication of the article is that they won't have a choice. If your product doesn't meet the repairability standards then you won't be able to sell in the EU.
The price to pay is it's harder to open when you need to repair it, but that's a sometime-maybe-never activity, vs. using/holding it which is hours per day.
In other words: because of the construction method, lots of space is needed for structural elements.
Large glass screens require a rigid structure (or a border of some kind).
A lot of people are pretty happy with that. For those that aren't, there's been a lot of progress in engineering in the past two decades since the 3310 came out.
It's not impossible to make something strong, while enjoying newer features. If we had a conscious choice in the shop between a slimmer phone that'll break apart in 6 months, and a thicker phone we could keep for 10 years, most people i know would choose the latter. There's just no such information for customers.
> The battery is tiny.
That was a technical limitation of the time and does not apply to today's batteries.
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/pr-created-...
I think consumer goods were made and advertised as being 'made to last'. However, it is far better for the manufacturer to have a customer that buys the same goods more frequently, say every 5 years, rather than every 20 or 30.
Bernais created the concept of a consumer and influenced the masses to buy goods so they could meet their unconscious desires, not according to function.
That is the root of the issue. If as consumers we think we're buying a fridge, but are actually unknowingly buying an aspirational lifestyle. We may think we're too savvy for to be taken in by marketing - but we are not. We need to get far more savvy!
What I would love to see is open source white goods: fridges, printers, ovens, cars even. And to use them.
We could (should) come back to the previous balance, and that would probably have a better environmental impact than all the (broken) promises of our governments.
But arguably a lot of people would support candidates/measures that introduced actual environmental/social regulations for products (driving prices upwards) if it were counter-balanced by a public program providing free repairs to all your utilities for decades. A such public program would certainly cost a lot less than repeated public funding of new technology.
Take cars for example. Most cars/trucks from the past century could be repaired given public support for that. That would be a strong ecological measure. However, governments around the world have invested billions of euros in "buy new cars" programs in the name of environment protection.. bringing even more ecological damage in the process.
For most products, the bulk of pollution and energy usage is related to production, not daily usage.
Also please keep in mind besides our personal feelings as users, such matters have a strong influence on the environment. More computers/smartphones have been produced than there are human beings on earth, yet we keep producing more. Planned obsolescence is a crime against humanity.
I will just tell you how your comment sounded to me. "I don't care about the biggest challenge humanity is facing at the moment if that means I will have to be slightly inconvenienced by the design and integration of products."
And a lot of people use phone cases. Of course, it's also true a lot of people don't use phone cases.
Very unscientific measurement: all people i know who don't use a phone case is because they couldn't easily find one for their phone and/or reuse their previous one. If mobile phones had standard sizes, every one would use a phone case and there would be less broken phones overall.
The bigger issue here is (1) e-waste, (2) critical infrastructure.
Additionally, you haven't read the article properly because it concerns mostly large appliances like washing machines, dishwashers, fridges, etc. This is not exactly the kind of devices where you'll pop off covers and save up millimeters of space.
If you've ever acquired furniture/tools/machines from the past century (or before that), you probably know what i'm talking about.
I have anecdata in the forms of testimonies from elders about durability of hardware (in general), and from my own experience when i was younger. For example, i remember buying socks/pants/shoes that would last me years and years ; i don't remember when exactly was the last time i bought one of those and it lasted me more than a year, but that was long ago.
Then, there's actual evidence pointing to the industry sabotaging their products on purpose (planned obsolescence). This ranges from historical insider documents to public testimonies.
The most obvious user-facing examples are manuals, availability of spare parts, and warranty times. It was not uncommon for products to have lifetime (or 20y) warranty, and to come with a manual. There were an abundance of clothing/electronics shops in every city where you could get spare parts for cheap, and these shops have mostly closed down due to bad economic incentives.
There are multiple manufacturers of washers, surely they would have done the market research to know what will sell.
I recently purchased a washer and dryer from Costco for $1,600 with a 4 year warranty. There were no options for a longer warranty at Costco, but suppose a machine with a 20 year warranty costs $3k. I might still choose the 4 year warranty option and gamble on it lasting 10 years and then getting new ones when it breaks.
The longest warranty on a consumer washer, Speed Queen, is 5 years I think. Their commercial options are similar (for hotels), I didn’t see any 5+ year options last I checked. And their commercial versions are pretty repairable.
I’m guessing the economics just don’t line up where the washers and dryers are so cheap with a few years of warranty that it can’t offset labor costs and other costs of longer warranties. No one is stopping a company from coming in and offering a 20 year warranty washer dryer, except that consumers won’t buy it at the price it would have to sell at.
As for tackling pollution due to excess waste, I think the more efficient, easier, better way to tackle that is to increase taxes on fossil fuels and other sources of pollution. That will cause increases in prices of goods, which will force consumers to value longevity and repairability, which will then cause manufacturers to also value those aspects.
There is no reason for that. A more solid/reliable machine doesn't have to be more expensive. Using better materials may cost up to 20% more i believe, but will certainly not cost several times the price of the reference (faulty) product.
Also it's important to note planned obsolescence is usually not even the result of bad materials, but conscious sabotage. For example, placing capacitors near a source of heat (looking at you TV manufacturers).
> No one is stopping a company from coming in and offering a 20 year warranty washer dryer
That's not entirely true. The few that did had to stop because unfair competition (using poor labor/environmental regulations) were driving the prices down. Not all manufacturers are exactly playing the same game, but all manufacturers you will find in a consumer-oriented shop are in it, and there's no public policy to build incentives out of this unhealthy system.
> consumers won’t buy it at the price it would have to sell at
Many people will if the arguments are exposed in a reasonable manner. Durable products with available spare parts are considerably cheaper in the long run: a washing machine that lasts 60y for 2000$ (plus maybe 200$ of repairs over the years) is more viable than buying a 500$ machine every five years (2200$ vs 6000$). And that's assuming hardware even lasts 5y, which in many cases it does not.
There is no reliable information for consumers to know about such long-term prices so they just fall into the trap and keep on buying new hardware that'll break down soon. The repairability index is a small step in the good direction (though not nearly good enough).
Source? I have a hard time believing that there exists the ability to sell a longer lasting product at a sufficiently low price, and yet no business is taking advantage of this to steal business from the incumbents.
> Also it's important to note planned obsolescence is usually not even the result of bad materials, but conscious sabotage. For example, placing capacitors near a source of heat (looking at you TV manufacturers).
I don’t know about this. I’ve always bought mid to higher end TVs and they have never died on me. The commercial ones I buy for hotels also come with 5 year warranties, and over 10+ years of LCD/LED TVs I can’t recall a single one that simply died. My electronics seem to be lasting longer and longer, but I also don’t buy the lowest price products.
> That's not entirely true. The few that did had to stop because unfair competition (using poor labor/environmental regulations) were driving the prices down.
Yes, but that’s the world we live in. As I wrote, the solution to this is increasing taxes on fossil fuels and other sources of pollution and imports from countries with lax environmental and labor regulations.
> Many people will if the arguments are exposed in a reasonable manner. Durable products with available spare parts are considerably cheaper in the long run: a washing machine that lasts 60y for 2000$ (plus maybe 200$ of repairs over the years) is more viable than buying a 500$ machine every five years (2200$ vs 6000$). And that's assuming hardware even lasts 5y, which in many cases it does not.
How are you projecting labor costs over 60 years? In my adult life of 15 years, labor costs for anything remotely skilled have double, and I don’t expect to pay anything less than $100/hour today. And I don’t know anyone who is replacing hardware every 5 years. It just doesn’t jive with my experiences that all these appliances people have are breaking down so often in 5 years.
And I do not think that the people buying cheap products today are doing so because they don’t have the information. People buy cheap garbage because they either can’t afford the more expensive, higher quality products, or they are sacrificing durability for some other feature.
People buy German or American cars when surely everyone by now knows Toyota and Honda are bulletproof and easy to repair. And that’s a bigger purchase than any household appliance.
Some are, but on the margins because they are either not part of the mass distribution networks (grande distribution), or don't have enough $$$$ to spend considerable resources on advertising.
Facom hardware for instance is very durable. They used to have lifetime warranty, now it's 60 years which is already pretty good. Facom hardware is anywhere from 2 to 5 times the price of discount hardware, as the difference in raw material prices greatly affects tooling. But you don't find Facom in most hardware/DIY stores, and when you do they will not be marketed as "something cheaper is just utter crap that you'll have to buy again and again and again and will cost you a lot more in the long run".
For more complex mechanics/electronics, the price difference doesn't have to be so great. Investing a few more cents/euros overall for better components, alongside with better design, will improve durability by years. Infamously, LED lightbulbs could have much greater lifespans with slightly-better electronic parts.
> I’ve always bought mid to higher end TVs and they have never died on me.
Good for you. That's just not the experience of average consumers nowadays. I don't know where you live, but here in France it's really common to find abandoned flatscreens on the streets just because a single component has died.
Samsung in particular was denounced for placing capacitors in their TVs near the heatsinks, which is conscious sabotage as any electronician can tell you that will greatly reduce their lifespan.
> the solution to this is increasing taxes on fossil fuels and other sources of pollution and imports from countries with lax environmental and labor regulations.
That makes entire sense, but designing a tax system that does not overwhelmingly affect the poorest is hard. That was part of the debate with the carbon/fuel tax in the past decade, that rich people don't care to pay more but poorer folks will certainly loose a lot of buying power with something like this.
> How are you projecting labor costs over 60 years?
I'm not, i was giving a (very) high estimation of hardware costs, not including labor costs which you can get for free from local associations/hackerspaces (which could also be a public service) or for cheap from an electronics shop if there's one nearby.
> People buy cheap garbage because they either can’t afford the more expensive, higher quality products
That is correct, but durability is not evaluated and presented to consumers, so they cannot make informed decisions. Many people would be happy to pay twice the price for 10 times durability if they only knew for sure. But many times, putting more money (as a client) in a product doesn't rhyme with better durability, so people are reluctant to invest more.
That european law only mandates 2 years warranty for hardware doesn't help. 10 years is slightly less worse. But we really need to aim for 50-100 years if we want to tackle environmental challenges as a society. That, or dismantle the entire industry before it's done polluting everything and we can't even breathe/drink anymore.
I think we're both talking about the same goal, but differing on how to get there. I don't think it's realistic to expect legislate device longevity, nor to expect consumers to opt for it. People knowingly spend tens of thousands of dollars extra for cars that are not repair-able. Everyone has the choice of buying a Toyota, but for whatever reasons, they still buy other brands.
Therefore, my solution is to simply make people pay for consumption. It doesn't matter if you're poor or your rich, the knock on effects of consumption are the same. The matter of poor people not being able to consume as much as the rich, or the rich consuming too much compared to poor people is a different problem, easily solve by wealth redistribution, aka give poor people money.
But sufficiently high taxes on goods that we deem harmful to society is what will be the easiest way to solve the problem of over consumption. Unfortunately, I don't think it's achievable politically.
For the other components, i don't see any reason they couldn't last over a decade. Even if a single component fails (eg. touchscreen) it should be easily replaceable, and your device could be good to go for another ten years.
But to be fair, if all products lasted 10 years, that would be considerably better than the present situation (though not nearly enough).
I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand i agree a marathon has many small steps to walk. On the other hand, governments/companies have a long history of not caring about actual issues and stopping after the first step gave them good conscience that they were doing something about the problem...
I have an older 1000$ Miele washing machine and to repair it it costs 400$. For that price I can have a brand new machine with all the functions I want.
Unfortunately, the manufacturer had glued everything together, so I wouldn't be able to replace the broken part, but had to replace the entire drum, which raised the price to 600$
I decided to pay for a new washing machine instead, which cost me 800$, because other parts of the machine might be close to breaking as well, which would require additional expensive repairs due to everything being glued
The machine was five years old at that point and the one before died after five years as well, so all in all the maintenance cost for a washing machine is approximately 120$ per year (2*600/10)
If I had been able to extend the life of the machine by just 1 year with new bearings, that would still be a financial win, since 50$<120$
The cost of repairs are high because manufacturers prevent people from replacing the "cheap" parts of the appliances. If I have to pay 200$ more upfront, but I can double the lifetime of the appliance, that's a big saving for me
Not to mention, that governments could create tax incentives, like making repairs deductable or lowering taxes on spare parts, which will make the financial incentive even stronger
Edit: I apparently can't math - my current "maintenance" price is not 120$, but 160$ per year, as the cost of replacement is 800$, so the calculation should be 2*800/10
A repair economy is only more expensive when the whole of industry is a scam. Spare parts are usually really inexpensive to come buy (couple euros to repair a TV or a hard drive) but really hard to come by due to bad economic incentives.
The whole "new products" industry is based on wage slavery in the mines and the factories, and strong pollution/destruction of the environment for cheap energy/materials, which is a hidden cost not covered by the 100$ you paid your phone (or whatever).
If the economic incentives were more balanced (with working/environmental regulations), a repair economy would in fact be more sustainable/profitable than new products. Also worth noting, repairing existing goods could be considered a public service and be financed by governments, if they cared at all about ecology (which they certainly do not).
Many companies make it hard/impossible and expensive to repair things on purpose, because they really, really want you to buy something new every few years.
Mitigating this "build to fail" mentality is the very point of right to repair regulation.
Fortunately I know electronics and have a soldering iron, otherwise it would have been scrapped and she'd get a new one.
There's a local repair club[1] that shows up at shopping centers nearby every now and then and helps fixing consumer products for people. Great initiative IMHO.
This kind of legislation is likely to push up the initial purchase price but the overall cost should come down. So the $1000 Miele now costs $1200, but only costs $50 to repair.