EU promotes a unified charger standard, force Apple to introduce USB-C to the full range of products
The European Union announced that it will pass relevant laws and regulations to establish a universal charging solution for all related devices. The European Commission stated in its announcement that different and incompatible chargers between electronic devices are common, causing great inconvenience to consumers and a serious problem of e-waste. Over the years, through voluntary cooperation in the industry, in the past ten years, the relevant standards for mobile phone chargers have been reduced from 30 to 3, but it is still unable to provide a complete solution. Since 2009, the European Commission has been coordinating this matter to promote a universal charging solution for mobile phones and similar electronic devices.
In this revised proposal, the charging port and fast charging technology will be unified and coordinated, and USB-C will become the standard port for all smartphones, tablets, cameras, headphones, portable speakers, and handheld game consoles. At the same time, the European Commission recommends that chargers and electronic devices be sold separately to improve the convenience of consumers and reduce the production and disposal of chargers to effectively support environmental protection and digital transformation.
According to statistics, there are about 420 million mobile phones and other portable electronic devices in 2020 that sold in the EU. On average, each consumer will have three mobile phone chargers, and generally, only use two of them. In addition, 38% of consumers said that they have encountered the problem of not being able to charge their mobile phone at least once because the charger is not compatible. In order to meet the needs of daily use, it costs about 2.4 billion euros to purchase a charger separately every year, and eventually discarded or unsatisfied chargers will cause 11,000 tons of electronic waste.
Apple iPhone, AirPods, and some iPads still use the Lightning interface charging cable, and I don’t know how Apple deal with it.
