Implementation of 2013/35/EU in Germany - Risk Assessment based on Exposure Limit Values

The European Directive 2013/35/EU was implemented into German legislation by the EMF Ordinance in 2016. To improve the comprehensibility and usability of the EMF Ordinance, Technical Rules are currently being developed to assist employers, particularly in small and medium sized enterprises, to implement state of the art of occupational safety and health measures. By applying the information and measures contained in the Technical Rules, compliance with the EMF Ordinance is ensured Action Levels or Exposure Limit Values are used to assess risks associated with exposure to electromagnetic fields at workplaces. When comparing risk assessments based on Exposure Limit Values against those based in Action Levels, it is rather challenging to assess measured or calculated exposure values against Exposure Limit Values. Besides detailed information on risk assessment of electromagnetic fields at workplaces, Technical Rules provide employers with thorough instructions on how to apply Exposure Limit Values when assessing risks arising from electromagnetic fields providing a simple and guided approach to fulfil the requirements of the EMF Ordinance. When reflecting this from an international perspective, in the facet of applying Exposure Limit Values for EMF risk assessment, EN 50499 will be well complemented by the open access Technical Rules for the German EMF Ordinance.