Long-term lifetime trends of large appliances since the introduction in Norwegian households

Abstract

Longer lifetimes of consumer products are promoted as an element of sustainable consumption, yet there is a widespread notion that lifetimes are currently in decline, often attributed to planned obsolescence or throwaway mentality. However, empirical evidence is inconclusive and often subject to high uncertainties. Here, we explore long-term trends in the lifetimes of large household appliances using dynamic material flow analysis. We investigate the sales and ownership of these products since their introduction in Norwegian households and use this co-evolution to estimate the lifetimes. By combining two model types with uncertainty analysis, we show that a significant lifetime decrease was likely experienced only by washing machines (–45%) and ovens (–39%) around the 1990s–2000s. This finding challenges the narratives about planned obsolescence despite their prevalence decreasing consumer incentives for longer product use and repair. We suggest multiple technical, economic, and social factors that could be responsible for the decrease, for example, a reduction in relative prices of appliances or changes in habits surrounding laundry and kitchen use. Our results suggest that factors affecting product lifetimes are not uniform but context-dependent, which has implications for lifetime extension policy. The presented method could help monitor the long-term effectiveness of such a policy. This article met the requirements for a gold-gold JIE data openness badge described at http://jie.click/badges.