It had been in the works for a while, but now it has formally been adopted. From the article:
The regulation provides that by 2027 portable batteries incorporated into appliances should be removable and replaceable by the end-user, leaving sufficient time for operators to adapt the design of their products to this requirement.
Agreed. It seems an entirely valid amount of time. Plus that’s only when they must do this. I’m sure many companies are gonna be rushing to switch over ASAP, because they don’t want to risk waiting till last minute and will want to be able to still sell left over older models.
Also, people are mistakenly thinking only of phones. The article makes it clear this is applies to everything. Most electronics don’t come out annually like phones do. There are tons of electronics that would never have been redesigned and now probably need to be if they want to keep selling them.