§ Norman BakerTo ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what estimate 887W she has made of the daily energy consumption resulting from the use of standby units on televisions; and if she will make a statement. [139192]
§ Mr. MorleyThe Government's Market Transformation Programme estimates that the 61.5 million televisions in the UK consume approximately 38 million KWh of electricity per day. Of this approximately 3.3 million Kwh (8.5 per cent.) per day is consumed by these televisions while they are in stand-by mode.
The Government is aware of the potential for many types of appliance to consume significant amounts of energy while left in stand-by mode. It is therefore already working via the Market Transformation Programme (www.mtprog.com) to encourage manufacturers to reduce both the "on" and "stand-by" power consumption of household appliances, including televisions, through the adoption of design improvements, voluntary codes of conduct, and the establishment of best practice guidelines and targets. To date this approach has been fairly successful and we expect that the majority of new televisions sold in the UK should soon consume around 1 watt of power in stand-by mode rather than the 3–8 watts consumed by older models.
In addition, the Government's recently announced commitment to purchase goods and services that meet higher environmental standards ("Quick Wins") requires any government department which purchases televisions to specify a stand-by power requirement of no more that 1 watt.