TL;DR
- The European Council has ended its adoption procedure for rules related to phones with replaceable batteries.
- By 2027, all phones released in the EU must have a battery the user can easily replace with no tools or expertise.
- The regulation intends to introduce a circular economy for batteries.
Please explain why a phone would need to weigh more, be less durable and be thicker simply because it has a usable replaceable battery. The battery would surely be the same size and regardless.
Sure. A typical pillow battery that is in your phone is bendable, gets damaged easily and is in general a fire hazard. So, to make it usable by consumers it needs to have at least some casing around it. In addition, you effectively need two back covers - one for phone internals and another for the battery. If you’ve had an older phone you know what im talking about. For durability, that’s a bit out of ass but what Ive learned from experience is that durability is not about thick cases and rubber pads, but rather, it’s all about weight - the lighter the phone is the less likely it is to crack from a fall, and all that extra bulk would likely make it more fragile.