The last time the European Union discussed the issues around plug/socket harmonisation they more or less concluded that the best way forward to allow the CEE 7 family of plugs that fits the Schuko and French type grounded 16 outlets to become the de facto standard across the entire continent.
Only Denmark and Italy (and Switzerland which is non EU) have an alternative system and in both cases, it's just the earthing pin is different, so the majority of appliances with non-grounded plugs will continue to fit without issue.
The proposal was that the non-CEE 7 sockets should only be installed where unavoidable, but that either Schuko or French sockets should be installed in new wiring.
The other proposal was that the BS1363 countries - Ireland, Cyprus and Malta and obviously the UK, but that's now living the EU would just continue as they are, but that the adaptors would be more tightly regulated to allow safe swapping between two plug systems i.e. the 'Rectangular pin system" and the "two round pin system".
So effectively Europe would end up with two acceptable solutions to plugs and sockets, one of which would be CEE 7 and the other BS1363.
There wasn't much movement on any of this stuff since then though and Brexit will have complicated matters further now too.
The general conclusion was that there was no real benefit that outweighs the cost in replacing either BS1363 or Schuko, but that there was a case for phasing out the Danish and Italian systems as they provided no real technical barriers to replacement nor did they provide any advantages that were worth retaining.
As a non-EU country, the Swiss system was not really even discussed.
Last edited by djk; 01/28/20 06:14 PM.
