Sky wants to do its bit for the environment this year by introducing an automatic standby mode for all of its Sky HD boxes and, later, for its Sky+ boxes.

The idea is to cut the amount of power being wasted by entertainment devices that people forget to, or don’t bother to switch off. According to Sky’s maths, this will slash the electricity bills of Sky customers by around £7.6m a year, and result in enough spare juice to light all the homes in Wolverhampton for a year.

The broadcaster will introduce an ‘Auto-Standby’ function that will allow it to put people's Sky box into standby mode if they are not watching it late at night. The function will kick in between 11pm and 4am.

If the signal shows the box has not been in use for two hours during this time period, a message will flash up on the screen and if no-one is watching TV, the box will go into standby mode.

It will remain in standby until it is switched on again but the boxes will still be able to record when in this mode. Auto Standby can be overridden by pressing back up to continue viewing or permanently switched it off in the Settings menu.

Sky said apart from a few older Sky digital set-top boxes, this function will be rolled out to all its customers over the coming months.

However, even this move may not be enough to please the European Union.

Britons are accused of wasting the equivalent of around two power stations' worth of electricity each year by leaving TV sets and other gadgets such as mobile phone chargers on standby.

This means the European Union wants to go even further. It wants to outlaw computers, televisions and other devices such as DVD players with standby settings.

These gadgets are targeted in a new legislative drive aimed at getting people to turn off their energy "vampire appliances" and help cut the EU's energy con sumption by 20 per cent by 2020.

Manufacturers have until 2012 in which to get their products to the required standards although whether standby is stamped out remains to be seen. Many manufacturers believe this is not viable for some devices such as TV set-top boxes.