Air conditioner certification and electrical appliances

Air conditioner certification follows the pattern of every mains-powered product: a safety test to the product standard (EN 60335-2-40 for air conditioners, EN 60335-1 for other household appliances, EN 62368-1 for audio, video and ICT equipment, EN 60598-1 for luminaires), an EMC test to EN 55014 or EN 55032, and a RoHS file under Directive 2011/65/EU. Appliances add an energy label under Regulation (EU) 2017/1369, and anything with a radio adds a radio approval.

Which standard is my product tested to?

Safety comes under the Low Voltage Directive 2014/35/EU, which covers equipment rated 50 to 1,000 V AC or 75 to 1,500 V DC, and the test runs to the harmonised standard for the product type. Household appliances go to EN 60335-1 with a Part 2 sheet: 2-40 for air conditioners and heat pumps, 2-24 for refrigerators, 2-7 for washing machines. IT and audio equipment goes to EN 62368-1, which replaced EN 60950-1 and EN 60065 in December 2020. Luminaires go to EN 60598-1.

EMC is Directive 2014/30/EU. Appliances and tools are measured to EN 55014-1 for emissions and EN 55014-2 for immunity, multimedia and IT equipment to EN 55032 and EN 55035. It is the test most often failed at the first attempt; a ferrite, a filter or a grounding change fixes most failures if the schedule still has room for a second session.

Restricted substances come under RoHS, Directive 2011/65/EU: ten substances, each capped at 0.1 % by weight in any homogeneous material, cadmium at 0.01 %. This is a paper exercise resting on supplier declarations and a complete bill of materials, and the bill of materials is the weak point: swap in a different relay mid-series and the file is out of date the same day.

What extra rules apply to air conditioners?

An air conditioner is tested to EN 60335-2-40 in Europe and UL 60335-2-40 in the United States, the particular standard for heat pumps, air conditioners and dehumidifiers. The current editions cover mildly flammable A2L refrigerants such as R-32 and R-454B: charge limits tied to room area, leak detection, installer markings. A report to an older edition written around R-410A does not cover them.

Refrigerant and energy are regulated apart from safety. In the EU, Regulation (EU) 2024/573 on fluorinated greenhouse gases bans single split systems holding less than 3 kg of F-gas with a refrigerant GWP of 750 or more from 1 January 2025, which rules out R-410A there. The energy label comes from Regulation (EU) 2017/1369 with its air-conditioner delegated act, Regulation (EU) No 626/2011, and the minimum SEER and SCOP values sit in Ecodesign Regulation (EU) No 206/2012; the model goes into the EPREL database before sale. In the United States the Department of Energy has set the floor by the SEER2 test procedure since 1 January 2023.

Why do appliances stall at the energy label?

Large appliances face mandatory energy minimums and an energy efficiency label in the European Union, the United States and the Eurasian Economic Union, and the classes do not line up. In the EU the minimums come from the Ecodesign Directive 2009/125/EC, being superseded by the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (EU) 2024/1781, through a product-specific regulation for each group, and the label from the Energy Labelling Regulation (EU) 2017/1369, whose rescaled A to G scale has applied to refrigerators, washing machines, dishwashers and displays since 1 March 2021.

Energy testing is slow, and refrigerator certification waits on it: a test to EN 62552 runs for days per sample in a climate chamber, and the chamber queue is longer than the safety bench queue. It sets the critical path for an appliance launch, and it cannot start until the final compressor and firmware are frozen.

On the EAEU side the safety document is an EAC certificate under TR CU 004/2011 on low-voltage equipment, with the same voltage bands as the LVD, issued together with TR CU 020/2011 on electromagnetic compatibility. Household appliances are on the certification list, so a declaration is not an option, and the certificate must come from a body listed by Rosakkreditatsiya.

Do batteries and power supplies need their own approval?

Yes, and lithium battery certification is two campaigns. Lithium cells and batteries carry transport requirements under UN 38.3 of the UN Manual of Tests and Criteria, and the eight UN 38.3 transport tests are a separate campaign from the safety test to IEC 62133-2. Shipping samples to the certification lab can itself require the UN 38.3 test summary first. In the EU the Battery Regulation (EU) 2023/1542 has applied since 18 February 2024, with the battery passport following on 18 February 2027.

Power supply certification has efficiency rules of its own: external power supplies fall under Ecodesign Regulation (EU) 2019/1782 in Europe and the Department of Energy Level VI marking in the United States. They get missed because the adapter arrives as a bought-in component with somebody else's certificate, and that certificate covers the adapter alone.

What each product typically needs