Luminaire Certification in Europe: LVD, EMC and RoHS

What does CE certification confirm?

That the product conforms to the safety standards adopted in the European Union.

A luminaire is a lighting product in the general sense, indoor and outdoor lights of every kind, and CE certification for all of them rests on the same three directives.

Which standards apply to each luminaire type?

The safety standard varies with the fitting; the EMC and RoHS references do not.

That asymmetry shapes the plan: a manufacturer with a wide range needs a separate safety assessment per fitting type, but the EMC work, CISPR 15 for emission, IEC 61547 for immunity, is common across the range.

Do you need a notified body?

For a luminaire, normally no, and this is the part manufacturers most often assume wrongly, because “certification” implies an external body issuing something.

All three directives run on self-declaration. Under the Low Voltage Directive the manufacturer performs the conformity assessment itself; under the EMC Directive the same holds where the harmonised standards are applied in full, via internal production control. RoHS works the same way. No notified body number appears on an EMC-only product, and a number quoted where none was involved is itself a defect.

The EMC Directive keeps an optional route where a notified body gives an opinion on the technical documentation, used where harmonised standards are not applied in full, or not applied at all.

What must the Declaration of Conformity carry?

One declaration can cover all three directives, and normally does:

• The product, identified well enough to trace it, model, type, batch or serial
• The manufacturer’s name and address, and the authorised representative where there is one
• A statement that the declaration is issued under the manufacturer’s sole responsibility
• Each Union act being declared against, with its publication reference: LVD, EMC and RoHS
• The dated references of the harmonised standards applied
• Place and date of issue, and the signature with the signatory’s name and function

It must exist before the product goes on the market, and be updated whenever a change affects compliance. A declaration citing an undated standard, or a superseded edition, is the most common file defect and the easiest to avoid.

Where this connects to other markets

The same IEC 60598-2 parts underpin CB certification, and the Customs Union’s GOST standards for lighting are drawn from the same series. A European technical file is therefore rarely wasted when the product later goes to another market; the work is in mapping evidence to the receiving system rather than regenerating it.

Sources

• Directive 2014/35/EU on the making available on the market of electrical equipment designed for use within certain voltage limits
• Directive 2014/30/EU on electromagnetic compatibility
• Directive 2011/65/EU (RoHS 2)
• IEC 60598-2 series; IEC 61547; CISPR 15