A critique on European Union EMC Directive and its implications

From first January 1996, members of the European Union (EU) countries have adopted a unified approach for compliance to electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) requirements for the electrical or electronic equipment or systems being used in the EU member countries. The EMC Directive 89/336/EEC was originally slated to January 1992 for implementation and was subsequently accorded a phasing out time of four years and finally came into force on January 1st, 1996. While the basic philosophy behind the effort was to harmonise various EMC standards followed by EU member countries causing trade barriers, adoption of the Directive has far-reaching implications on the other countries exporting equipment and systems to the UK member countries. This paper deals with various features of the EMC Directive, implementation procedures, current status and approach required to be adopted by the countries interested in exporting products to the countries within the European Union