The UK's Regulations for Compliance with the EC Directive on Electromagnetic Compatibility (89/336/EEC) and Experience to Date

1.1 There is a growing need to introduce EMC between a wide range of electrical and electronic devices which are used, increasingly, in everyday life and which by their very nature can act as radio transmitter or receiver, thereby causing serious interference with, for example, communication and electronic navigation systems. Furthermore, the use of mobile telephones and personal computers has grown dramatically over the past five years, as indeed have household electrical appliances incorporating microprocessor control circuits, all of which can either cause electromagnetic interference affecting the operation of other devices, or in themselves become affected by such interference thereby preventing them from operating as intended - sometimes with devastating results.