Labeling of Present and Future Ex Equipment

The marking of Explosion Protected 'Ex' equipment is a certification requirement of both International (IEC) and European (EN) standards. Further additional marking is required to meet the requirements of certain countries, for example ATEX for the European Union; GOST for Eastern Europe; FM, UL or other nationally recognized test laboratories and CSA for Canada. As manufacturers attempt to show all certification marks to allow products to be sold to a wide range of markets (and also as a badge of achievement !), the simple equipment label becomes a highly congested area which must also contain other information not related to its 'Ex' certification, such as manufacturers name; type; rating; etc. Unless the label is condensed it can often become larger than the equipment itself, and this poses additional challenges to the users. The competency requirements to read and understand the label information is increasing at a time when the availability of skilled labour is decreasing. This difficult situation occurs when the new product is removed from its packing. The user is faced with far greater problems once the item is put into service. This paper sets out to summarise some of the issues associated with the 'Simple label' and invites discussion on possible changes to aid users in the future.The paper covers: the environments in which the labels are used (i.e. marine / desert environments); the life of the label; the problems associated with losing or being unable to read the information on the label; the additional IEC information on gas groups, etc.; how the manufacturers could help the end-user with required information on the label; the traceability of equipment certification if labels cannot be read; the possibility of a copy of the details of the label on the fitting instructions; the cost and time implications to manufacturers; the tagging or bar coding of equipment.