Opportunities for regional harmonization of appliance standards and l abeling program

The South Asian Regional Initiative for Energy (SARI/Energy) calls for a series of activities to promote Energy Efficiency Standards and Labeling (EES&L) of end use appliances in the region. In pursuit of this goal, the project supports several seminars and meetings that bring together policymakers and stakeholders from throughout the region. The purpose of these gatherings is to encourage a dialogue among participants as to the benefits and barriers associated with EES&L programs. In addition, it is the role of the program organizers to provide participants with the technical details necessary to make progress towards effective efficiency programs. One component of the initiative is to encourage the harmonization (alignment) of existing program components, and the pursuit of new programs coordinated at the regional level. In support of this goal, the report provides information aimed at motivating and enabling cooperative activities which will provide concrete benefits to programs in each country, whether well developed, or still in the initial planning stage. It should be emphasized that the underlying objective of the harmonization component of the SARI/Energy project is to increase the potential for success of EES&L programs of all countries involved, and to reduce burdens on manufacturers, exporters and importers in each country. Harmonization ''for it's own sake'' is not desirable, nor is it suggested that policymakers should bring their programs in line with international norms if doing so would present a disadvantage to their own efficiency programs, or to commercial interests within their country. If there is no such disadvantage, however, the program encourages alignment of policies and provides a forum at which this alignment can be pursued. The report covers several main topics, with varying emphasis. First, a general discussion of the motivation for an explicit policy of regional harmonization is given. Next, the current status of existing programs in the region are discussed in some detail. The section that follows covers the harmonization of efficiency test procedures. Special attention is given to this component of an EES&L program because it is the most critical element in terms of harmonization--having incompatible test procedures between trade partners can greatly impact the effectiveness of a program, and it can also unduly impact trade. Currently, policymakers in India and Sri Lanka are collaborating with the goal of aligning refrigerator test procedures used in their respective programs. For this reason, the section on test procedures of refrigerators goes into a significant amount of technical detail, in order to provide the clearest possible articulation of issues to be resolved in bringing the procedures into alignment. Following the discussion of test procedures, the report contains a section each on harmonization of efficiency rating levels, development of label designs, and enforcement issues. The report is organized such that the sections covering current programs and test procedures are subdivided by target appliance. These sections are further divided by country, where applicable. Each section is concluded with recommendations