Wine Cooler Energy Labels
Why does almost every wine fridge rank "G" on the energy labels since March 2021?
Since the last revision of the energy labels back in 2010, the electronics industry has improved their energy efficiency so much that 90% of new appliances were ranked as an A, A+ or A++ or A+++, and while that was great news for the environment and for the marketing guys at the wine cooler companies, it wasn't so helpful to the consumer anymore. If everyone gets an A, who is actually efficient?
To make the energy scale useful again the scale was restructured and whilst this has helped the customer make useful comparisons for many appliances it has seen wine fridges that were ranked as high as A+ fall to the bottom strata of G, along with almost all other wine fridges. So while we had a problem with all appliances being highly ranked before, for wine fridges, they are all now lowly ranked. It's the same problem for the consumer now when making energy comparisons using the scale, just in reverse.
To really understand how efficient one wine fridge is against another you need to look at the kWh / annum calculation underneath the coloured scale.
As appliances go, freestanding wine fridges are not the most energy efficient of electrical appliances. There is no "stand-by", wine coolers are on at all times and must maintain a constant temperature, unlike a television for example, but the good news is that appliances are at least ranked in some manner against those of a similar type. But even this has its pitfalls; more on that later...
So what do all these extra bits on the label mean?
- The scale now runs from A-G Vs A+++-D.
- There's a box for the annual energy consumption of the appliance. Remember this box, this kWh / annum calculation is the one that matters.
- The label now includes the number of Bordeaux style bottles the wine cooler can hold.
- The label now includes the noise level of the wine fridge in decibels.
The most useful number, if you want to compare apples and apples, or more specifically, wine coolers and wine coolers, is to compare that annual energy consumption box in the middle of the label marked kWh / annum.
This number is more indicative of actual cost to you to run your wine fridge per year than the coloured scale because the scale takes size of the appliance (volume) into account, this can mean that two wine fridges, one much bigger in volume but more efficient relationally to its size can rank higher on the colour scale but is actually using more energy and costing more to run per year.
Sounds confusing? If monitoring energy efficiency is high on your priorities for either environmental or financial reasons, or both, when choosing a wine cooler then follow this tip.
Top tip: When making a shortlist of your favourite wine fridges, try to compare not only the buying price and bottle capacity but actually this kWh / annum calculation number and not the coloured efficiency scale. This number gives you the actual amount of energy used in kWh / annum that can be calculated in pounds and pence whereas the coloured scale could lead you to buying a wine fridge that uses more energy.
So there it is. I'm impressed you've made it to the final sentence but I think we've all learnt something useful today?
Which are the most energy efficient wine coolers?
- Single zone wine coolers are usually a little more efficient than dual zone wine coolers.
- Of all the brands we currently offer, Swisscave wine fridges tend to have the best energy efficiency ratings.