There is no doubt the European Union sees itself as the world’s green crusader, fighting climate-change and saving the planet one wind turbine at a time. From the vacuum cleaner to the light bulb, there is no electrical appliance too small for the Eurocrats to regulate or prohibit.

Brussels’ plans to restrict high-wattage electrical appliances are strikingly similarly to their coffee machine regulation. In April, Get Britain Out exposed their plan to ban coffee machines which stay on keeping the beverage hot indefinitely, and replace them with machines which automatically go on stand-by after 40 minutes. The motivation is the same, ‘correcting’ the design of household appliances in order to save a miniscule amount of energy.

The full consequences will of course outweigh any benefit to be derived by saving energy, not only because using some high-powered machines can often prove to be more effective because of better performance, which means the device would be used less often and therefore saving energy on the balance.

The greatest harm inflicted by the EU’s energy policies is more than mere stifling of consumer choice, but in making energy more expensive, increasing household energy bills and devastating industry. An analyst at Oxford University’s Institute for Energy Studies warned: “The cost of Europe’s clean energy policies has also risen, and will rise further, as a result of the Commission’s proposals, made in January 2014, for EU energy and climate change targets.”

The firm Accenture also argues: “The high cost of energy in Europe… has become one of the biggest threats to the competitiveness of European industry. When compared with other regions of the world, industrial energy costs in Europe are substantially higher.” According to research by Business for Britain, the ever-rising costs of energy could threaten 1.5 million jobs in the energy-intensive sector alone.

Let’s not be fooled: these economically illiterate policies are conceived by Luddites. We cannot afford to inflict severe harm on our energy-intensive industries, nor sacrifice prosperity on the altar of idealism. Without international cooperation, particularly from the BRICS nations which are rapidly expanding their industries, European efforts to deal with climate change are futile.

The EU has no interest in looking at the problem from a different perspective, or consider whether their shallow efforts might undermine their goal of reducing carbon emissions. Actually, the best way to do the latter would be build more nuclear reactors rather than relying on wind-farms in the middle of nowhere to secure microscopic CO2 decreases.

Furthermore, with the Eurocrats at the helm the EU doesn’t need to provoke a nuclear war with Russia to plunge Europe back into the Stone Age. All we need to do is wait as industries flee Europe and its extortionate energy costs. The future is ours to hand over to Brussels, or to take back. We must Get Britain Out, restore national sovereignty and establish our own energy policies which best serve our national interests.