In the past, we have often talked about standards that have not yet been published in the Official Journal. Today, we are talking about standards that will be removed from the EU Official Journal and are unlikely to receive a successor for the time being.
The EU Commission is also paying more attention to the issue of "neutrality of technology" for standards that are already listed or harmonized standards that are to be listed in the future. The topic is basically not new, but it should be better enforced in the future.
Two examples:
This (much-needed) standard is not listed in the EU Official Journal:
ETSI EN 303 687 V1.1.1 (2023-06)
6 GHz WAS/RLAN;
Harmonized Standard for access to radio spectrum
(RED Art.:3.2)
The HAS consultant and the EU Commission have no technical objections to this long-awaited standard.
The EU Commission considers the neutrality of the technology to be violated because the ETSI standard refers to an IEEE standard. IEEE 802.11ax:2021, which describes the functionality of the wireless standard, can be regarded as the basis for the technology.
Unfortunately, IEEE is not an internationally recognized standards organization and therefore, from the point of view of the EU Commission, the reference to IEEE standards is not permitted. As things stand, the standard is not listed in the EU Official Journal. This means that a notified body will be required if the technology is used. This is expected to recognize the application of ETSI EN 303 687 V1.1.1 (2023-06) for full compliance with the essential requirements for radio characteristics.
This standard is with drawn from the EU Official Journal (delisting):
ETSIEN 302 571 V2.1.1 (2017-02)
Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS);
Radiocommunications equipment operating in the 5 855 MHz to 5 925 MHz frequency band;
(RED Art.:3.2)
This harmonized standard has been listed without restrictions in the EU Official Journal of the RED since June 8, 2017 (until today). The standard is now due to be deleted by the Commission.
Reason:
The standard refers to IEEE 802.11:2012, which for the reasons mentioned in example 1 violates the neutrality of the technology that harmonized standards should have.
When will the EU Commission look at EN 300 328 V2.2.2 (2019-07)?
It is the standard for Bluetooth, WLAN and similar technologies. Here, too, there are, "naturally", a few references to IEEE, because the radio standards were specified there.
ETSI will certainly not be pleased with the EU Commission's approach, which will not help to normalize the relationship between the two parties.
As long as the standards are not canceled, hope remains.
We will keep you up to date and will be happy to provide you with further details.
Author
Dipl.-Ing. (FH) Torsten Sahm
Senior Product Compliance Consultant
TERMS AND ABBREVIATIONS
OJEU: Official Journal of the EU
RED: Radio Equipment Directive
ETSI: European Telecommunications Standards Institute.
One of the three EU standards organizations (ESO)
Standards = norms
