[time-nuts] CE Mark

[Poul-Henning Kamp]

In message <E1KU5dl-0007ub-AR at febo.com>, "Arnold Tibus" writes:
>A summary somewhat easier to read  you can find here:
>
>CE Marking: Your Passport to the European Union
>http://www.i-b-t.net/anm/templates/trade_article.asp?articleid=262&zoneid=3
>
>perhaps it can bring some more light into the darkness of the 
>worldtrade and the european market.

HA!

It doesn't even scratch the surface.

First of all, that article incorporates, tacitly, US corporate legal
liability thinking.

Mostly, there are only two steps in the generic CE process:

	Sign a piece of paper that says that you put the CE mark there.

	Put the CE mark there.

If your product does not live up to CE requirement, you have just
made yourself the bulls-eye of the lawsuit or regulatory action.

Obviously, anybody in a sane frame of mind would check that
the requirements are met before doing that, but the law doesn't
demand that you do so, it just assigns the liability.

In select areas, where the danger to life and limb is greater than
normal, cars, airbags and similar, there is a positive documentation
requirement.   As far as I know, no plain electrical gadget is under
that regime, until voltages above 500V are exposed or radio
transmission is involved.

Once you get beyond electrical gadgets, it gets weirder.

Take building materials: if they are CE marked, they can be sold
anywhere in the EU, but that doesn't mean that you are actually
allowed to build with them where you live.

A window that complies with building codes in Greece fail northern
energy-concious building codes. 

What Denmark consider a sound structual wall material would crumble
in the first minor tremblor in Greece.

You buy insulation materials from the northern end, and fumigate
your house in the southern end ?  You'd better not plan on moving
back into the house because it will take years for the poison gas
to be released again.

They're talking about putting CE marks on foodstuffs also, but that
is even more fraught with peril, because the "sell before date"
is climate variant on a lot of foodstuffs.

Poul-Henning

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