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Harmonised Minimum Energy Performance Standards and Energy Labelling for Africa

Kategorie: Heizen, kühlen & Gebäude
Status: laufend

Project background

An efficient refrigerator and an inefficient one look much the same on a shop floor. The difference shows up on electricity bills for the next fifteen years, and in the generating capacity a country has to build to serve them. Minimum Energy Performance Standards (MEPS) remove the worst products from the market before that cost is locked in, which makes them one of the least expensive instruments in energy policy. They work best when they are harmonised. Where neighbouring countries set different requirements, or none at all, the markets with the weakest rules become the destination for the least efficient products. Manufacturers face a different specification in every country, which raises the cost of supplying efficient models and slows their arrival. Fragmentation weakens the instrument for everyone. Africa has 55 African Union Member States at very different stages of standards development, and appliance markets that operate regionally rather than nationally. A continental framework, adopted through the regional economic communities, is the level at which the instrument can work.

HEAT services

On behalf of the African Energy Commission (AFREC), a specialised agency of the African Union, HEAT leads the development of harmonised MEPS and energy labelling for the 55 AU Member States. The work is funded by the Government of Denmark. It runs from 2024 to 2028 and covers ten product groups in two phases: air conditioners, electric motors, refrigerators and lighting in Phase I, and distribution transformers, commercial refrigerators, fans, washing machines, televisions and computers in Phase II, which began in May 2026.

For each product group HEAT delivers:

  • A technical handbook in English and French, setting out recommended efficiency tiers, the international test standards they rest on, and the regulatory text a Member State needs in order to adopt them.
  • Cost-benefit and life-cycle cost worksheets, so a ministry can calculate the effect of a given tier on its own market rather than relying on continental averages.
  • Training materials for the standards bodies, regulators and ministries that have to apply the requirements.
  • Market data and monitoring tools, including a continental map of current MEPS adoption and a data dashboard.
  • Country-level support for Member States moving from a regional recommendation to national regulation, which is where harmonisation is either achieved or lost.

The recommended tiers are built on the international test standards that manufacturers already work to, including the IEC standards for motor efficiency classes and LED lamps and the ISO standards for air conditioner and refrigerator testing. The approach follows the United for Efficiency model regulation guidelines and established practice on monitoring, verification and enforcement, so that a country adopting the recommendations can hold suppliers to them in practice. For refrigeration and air conditioning, the standards are designed to work with the Kigali Amendment HFC phase-down rather than against it. Delivery runs through the regional economic communities, including ECOWAS through ECREEE, SADC through SACREEE, and the East African Community.

Projektdetails

Auftraggeber: African Energy Commission (AFREC), a specialised agency of the African Union
Partner: AESG (Rwanda), GFA Consulting Group
Laufzeit: 2024 to 2028
Stand: 08/2026

Ergebnisse:

  • One set of requirements across the continent. The African Union gains a coherent set of appliance efficiency requirements covering ten product groups, in English and French, that any Member State can adopt. – A workable market for efficient products. Because the requirements are harmonised and routed through the regional economic communities, manufacturers can supply the same efficient model continent-wide instead of meeting a different specification in every country.
  • Member States able to legislate and enforce. Ministries and standards bodies are equipped to set an efficiency tier suited to their own market, calculate its costs and benefits with their own data, and hold suppliers to it through monitoring, verification and enforcement.
  • Lower electricity bills and avoided generating capacity. Removing the least efficient products reduces consumer running costs over the lifetime of the appliances purchased, and avoids capacity that would otherwise be built to serve inefficient equipment. – One equipment transition, not two. Because the refrigeration and air conditioning standards are aligned with the Kigali Amendment HFC phase-down, countries move their equipment stock once.
  • No market left as the outlet for excluded products. Harmonisation removes the incentive to route the least efficient appliances to whichever country has the weakest rules.

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