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COP26: A New Policy Paper Highlights the Contribution of Standards to the Fight Against Climate Change
On the occasion of COP26, CEN and CENELEC released the new policy paper “Uniting the world to tackle climate change: COP26 and the commitments of European Standards”. In the document, the two European Standardization Organizations reaffirm their commitment to contributing to the fight against climate change and raise awareness on the actions they are taking to contribute to addressing these challenges.
In particular, the policy paper highlights the role of standards in contributing to the green transition: “Standards foster the process of innovation and encourage the faster development of more environmentally friendly technologies and materials. Whether it is by specifying tests or providing robust definitions that avoid misleading environmental claims, standards have a key role to play in addressing the climate emergency.”
Based on this potential, the standardization community stands ready to play their part in ensuring that both Europe and the world are equipped to deliver the social and economic transition necessary to reduce the effects of climate change, while also helping to deliver the infrastructure necessary to increase the planet’s resilience to adapt to its impacts. The full text of the Policy Paper is available here.
Enormous potential for the future: 30 years of Vienna Agreement
Thirty years ago, the global economy was placed on a new footing in Vienna: the Vienna Agreement set the course for even closer co-operation and collaboration. What has changed since then? Fewer barriers to trade, more harmonized rules, and more room for innovation. Under the heading "From global to local: Joining forces to help global standards create local impact", the leaders of international standardization organizations such as CEN and ISO met again in Vienna on 11 October to further advance international co-operation. The Vienna Agreement was signed in Vienna 30 years ago. Its objective: ensure that European and international standards are not in conflict with each other, but that rather they are as consistent with each other as possible. The motto: "One standard, one test – accepted everywhere". Much has happened since then. Thanks to the Agreement, enterprises can rely on globally harmonized approaches to improving the quality of products and processes – there are uniform rules for measuring, testing and quantification of greenhouse gas emissions – parents can be confident that the packaging of drugs is child-resistant – the users of health apps can be sure of clear security levels for data protection and machinery manufacturers can use the same standards for exporting tractors to countries all over the world.
World’s First Non-Cellular 5G Technology, ETSI DECT-2020, Gets ITU-R Approval
ETSI DECT-2020 NR, the world’s first non-cellular 5G technology standard, has been recognized by the WP5D of the International Telecommunication Union’s Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) and included as part of the 5G standards in IMT-2020 technology recommendation. Dr. Günter Kleindl, Chair of the ETSI Technical Committee DECT, says: “With our traditional DECT standard we already received IMT-2000 approval by ITU-R twenty-one years ago, but the requirements for 5G were so much higher, that we had to develop a completely new, but compatible, radio standard.” Released last year, the standard sets an example of future connectivity: the infrastructure-less and autonomous, decentralized technology is designed for massive IoT networks for enterprises. It has no single points of failure and is accessible to anyone, costing only a fraction of the cellular networks both in dollars and in carbon footprint.
The IoT standard, defined in ETSI TS 103 636 series, brings 5G to the reach of everyone as it lets any enterprise set up and manage its own network autonomously with no operators anywhere in the world. It eliminates network infrastructure, and single point of failure - at a tenth of the cost in comparison to cellular solutions.
New EN 17507 to help Improve Measuring the Emissions of Road Vehicle A better integration of alternative fuels infrastructure, thanks to the CEN and CENELEC Guide 38
To accelerate the development of alternative fuels, multifuel stations integration is fundamental. CEN and CENELEC developed the new Guide 38 to facilitate the integration of alternative fuels at existing fueling stations and to give guidance to design, authorize and operate new multifuel stations in support of the Directive 2014/94/EU on the deployment of alternative fuels infrastructure and of the future Regulation replacing the directive. This CEN and CENELEC Guide also considers other legislations impacting multifuel stations (ATEX, PED, MID).
This new Guide is the result of a brilliant collaborative work led in the Working Group "Multifuel stations" of the CEN and CENELEC Sector Forum Gas Infrastructure, with experts of different technical committees involved in various fuels (natural gas, hydrogen, LPG). A large consultation was conducted to all the relevant CEN and CENELEC Technical Committees (CEN-CLC/JTC 6, CEN/TC 301, CLC/TC 69X, CEN/TC 268, CEN/TC 286, CEN/TC 326, CEN/TC 393, and CEN/TC 408) and coordination group (CEN-CLC/eMCG). Through Guide 38, the technical committees involved in the standardization of alternative fuels infrastructure will have a better view on how to ensure the global coherence of the integrated infrastructure when developing their respective standards.