UL, CSA to Develop Mutual Component Acceptance Program
Underwriters Laboratories Inc. (UL, Northbrook, IL) and CSA International (Toronto, Ontario, Canada) have signed agreements to establish a collaborative process leading to the mutual acceptance of certain components and to expand the certification organizations' 1996 data exchange Memorandum of Understanding.
Loring Knoblauch, president and chief executive officer of UL and Robert Griffin, president and CEO of CSA Group, signed the two documents in November 2003, during the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) Annual Meeting and Leadership Conference, in Washington, D.C.
The agreements are the result of several months of negotiation between UL and CSA, with support from NEMA, Electro-Federation Canada (EFC) and major electrical customers. CSA and UL signed an agreement to develop a mutual component acceptance program that will eventually provide for the acceptance of components used in end products submitted to UL or CSA for certification/listing. Under the terms of the agreement, each organization will accept the other organization's certification/listing of components in end-products provided that each organization can apply their existing component acceptance procedures to the components certified by the other organization, and only after equivalence of follow-up programs has been evaluated and confirmed.
The agreement will initially be limited to Low Voltage Distribution and Industrial Control Equipment and will be re-assessed over an 18-month period. The expanded Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) goes beyond the 13 product categories described in the 1996 MoU and will ultimately include all electrical end-product categories and standards for which UL and CSA are accredited by both the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Standards Council of Canada (SCC). Under the expanded MoU, manufacturers of electrical end products will be able to obtain both CSA and UL certification/listing on the basis of a single product test program carried out by one of the two organizations.
According to Knoblauch, the expanded MoU and proposed component-acceptance program are part of UL's ongoing effort to streamline the certification process for customers who seek both U.S. and Canadian market access.
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