Standards Compliance

This section briefly describes the two main arms of commercial standards: that is RF emissions and RF and transient immunity, and also refers to the UK and US military standards.

International standards are developed by ISO (International Standard Organisation), IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission) or CISPR(The Comité International Spécial des Perturbations Radioélectriques, International Special Committee on Radio Interference). ISO publish automotive EMC standards, but most EMC standards are produced by IEC/CISPR. European regional standards (EN) are developed by CENELEC(Comité Européen de Normalisation Électrotechnique,European Electrotechnical Standards Organisation) and ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) who use IEC/CISPR results wherever possible. The EN document will normally have identical technical content to the IEC document, but will be surrounded by a "wrapper" which specifies how the standard is to be used in the European context, particularly with regard to dates of application, references to other standards, and relevance to Directives. Occasionally, there may be differences between the EN and IEC versions, in which case the EN will have the word "modified" in the reference to the IEC document. Individual nations publish national standards such as BS (British Standards) that may adopt IEC/CISPR and EN standards.

Application of standards for EMC assessment

Having identified the EMC risks in terms of applicable EM phenomena to and from the apparatus, taking account of all normal intended operating conditions and configurations, three methods are possible for the EMC assessment.

•Application of EMC harmonised/designated standards having checked whether the chosen standard(s) covers all the phenomena relevant to the product.

•An EMC assessment where no harmonised/designated standards have been applied and the manufacturer applies their own methodology (e.g. other technical specifications).

•Mixed assessment, combining the two previous methods. For example, one could use the harmonised/designated standards to cover emission phenomena and a detailed technical EMC assessment for immunity aspects.

The most common method of demonstrating compliance with EMC Directive/Regulation is by self certification to harmonised/designated standards. The manufacturer may test the product in-house or at an external test house to determine compliance. Normally, testing is required however it is not mandated. Harmonised/designated standards reflect the generally acknowledged "state of the art" and provide "presumption of conformity" with the essential requirements covered by those standards.

In commercial EMC testing, there are three types of standards:

•Basic standards: These standards define the fundamental testing methods and procedures that are common across various products. They provide the foundational guidelines for conducting EMC tests.

•Product standards: Each specific product type typically has its own set of product standards. These standards are tailored to the particular product category and specify the test levels, test procedures, and frequency ranges that are relevant for that type of product.

•Generic standards: In cases where a product does not have specific product standards that apply to it, generic standards come into play (e.g. medical standard 60601-1-2 or industrial standard 61000-6-3/4).

This section includes the following parts: