Just how much energy does your television use?
A new study from the Natural Resources Defense Council claims flaws in federal energy tests on televisions have allowed large manufacturers like Samsung, LG and Vizio to significantly understate their devices’ power consumption.
By devising its own test it called more realistic than the government’s, the New York-based environmental activist group found TVs can wind up using more energy than reported on the yellow EnergyGuide labels required by the Federal Trade Commission. The labels allow shoppers to compare energy use between products.
The study found that televisions could pass under test conditions but usage could soar by up to 45 percent in real-world situations, raising questions of whether manufacturers were purposefully manipulating their software — akin to the “defeat devices” Volkswagen used that circumvented emissions tests — to gain a competitive advantage.
Manufacturers flatly denied they were trying to defeat the tests.
“LG has followed both the letter and spirit of the DOE test procedure for TV energy testing,” Kim Regillio, a spokeswoman for LG, said in a written statement. “In LG’s case, we are confident that our products are being tested properly and are delivering energy efficiency in real world use.”
“Samsung firmly rejects the accusation that we are misleading consumers,” a Samsung spokesperson said. Efficiency ratings are “based on the default setting of our TVs. The majority of users stay within the default viewing settings through the lifetime of their television. Furthermore, we strongly believe that consumers should always have the option to customize the viewing experience on their TV.”
The U.S. Department of Energy measures energy consumption in televisions by playing 10-minute high-definition video clip. That test clip consists of 250 very short scenes stitched together — an average scene cut of 2.29 seconds.
Last year, the NRDC and consultant Ecos Research began to independently test energy consumption patterns for new ultra highdefinition televisions, said Noah Horowitz, the director of the group’s center for energy efficiency standards. The team observed “inexplicable, dramatic and sustained drops in energy use.” Not long afterward, European energy agencies reported similar results.
An article last year in The Guardian, cited in the NRDC study, suggested the behavior was due to a motion-detection feature that reduces energy use when certain content is viewed.
Using more power at home
For the study, the researchers purchased four TVs — two Samsungs, an LG and a Vizio — companies that represent about half of all television sales. The NRDC assembled a test clip featuring clips from the HBO comedy Silicon Valley, the Rose Bowl football game, CNN news reels and commercials. The scenes cut an average of 3.89 seconds, or about 70 percent less frequently than the test clip the government uses.
That the government’s test method contains much shorter scenes and more frequent switches between them than a realistic content is an issue. Televisions are equipped with a feature that dims the backlight slightly as scene cuts get quicker.
“It is possible that some manufacturers have designed their TVs to detect the continuous occurrence of short scenes,” the report read. “This would allow a manufacturer to publish a very low average power use and gain a competitive advantage), even though the TV will draw considerably more power when consumers get it home.”
For about a third of consumers, the study estimates, televisions will draw even more power. This is mainly because some of the leading manufacturers — including Samsung, LG, and Vizio — have also designed their TVs to disable energy-saving features whenever users make changes to their picture settings. Roughly a third of television users are assumed to change their settings.
The financial impact on individual consumers is minimal. The report estimated consumers who change their picture settings are paying as much as $200 over the 10-year life span of the television.
But put together, Mr. Horowitz said, the implications are bigger, with $1.2 billion of electricity — and 5 million tons of carbon pollution in the atmosphere — that the government is not accounting for.
In a conference call with reporters last week, Chris Calwell, principal for Ecos Research, said the damage stretches beyond consumers to the companies that deliver them power. Ecos, he said, also works with electric utilities on energy-saving plans. In part, utilities offer customers rebates to buy energy efficient devices, as measured by the EnergyGuide ratings.
“Utilities count on the energy savings based on these government test procedures,” Mr. Calwell said. “Utilities are getting a less savings than they paid for; that has consequence for both the utilities and the environment.”
An outdated test
The energy department has acknowledged its test could be outdated. In June, the agency said it would explore possible changes.
“As consumer technology rapidly evolves, the Department of Energy strives to keep national product testing procedures up to date,” a DOE spokesman said in an email. “The department asked for more information from the public and companies to see if any changes to the TV test procedure are necessary.”
Ms. Regillio, the LG spokeswoman, said energy efficiency is a “shared goal” of the company and the NRDC.
“We look forward to working with the DOE and stakeholders to develop a new test clip going forward,” she said. “For now, the IEC test clip is the standard that the industry must follow according to applicable law.”
But she said that there is no consensus on how to define a test clip that represents “normal viewing.”
“The NRDC’s ‘normal viewing’ test clip and LG’s ‘normal viewing’ test clip show significantly different results,” she said.
The DOE test procedure was last updated in 2013.