The
EU Machinery Regulation, which is scheduled for publication next month and replaces the current Machinery Directive (Directive 2006/42/EC), contains numerous changes that address the safety of machinery and ‘must be observed by manufacturers and other economic operators’. It will enter into force throughout all EU Member States immediately upon adoption and must be applied 42 months after that date.
The Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on Machinery Products contains binding provisions for manufacturers and other economic operators governing machinery safety in the European Union. It increases legal certainty by defining binding requirements imposed on the design, construction and placing into operation of machinery and related products.
Pascal Staub-Lang, head of the Centre of Competence Machine Safety of TÜV SÜD Industrie Service GmbH, said: “By adopting the Machinery Regulation, the European Union has updated its regulatory provisions in line with the current state of the art. This involved expanding the scope of the contents in comparison to the current Machinery Directive still in effect and introducing more concrete provisions in some areas.
Collaborative robots“The march of digitalisation and connectivity has also resulted in the emergence of new safety and security risks that were only considered insufficiently, if at all, in the currently valid Machinery Directive. This is precisely the area involving the most important changes in the Machinery Regulation. Requirements in the new Regulation address areas including: cybersecurity of safety control systems and of software related to the conformity assessment of the machinery; use of artificial intelligence (AI) in safety functions; autonomous and remote-controlled mobile machinery; and collaborative robots.
“In addition, the Machinery Regulation will introduce the concept of ‘substantial modifications’, although this aspect requires further elucidation, and we will need to clarify how the Regulation is to be interpreted in detail with respect to concrete applications.”
The scope of the new Machinery Regulation has also been expanded in comparison to its predecessor, as it spans the entire supply chain and specifies ‘concrete obligations’ for all market participants. For example, distributors of new and used machinery will also need to address the topic in more depth in future. However, the Machinery Regulation will ease conditions in other areas; for example, the possibility of digital assembly and operating instructions, while the EU Conformity Assessment will significantly reduce administration work and costs for machinery manufacturers.
More information about the new EU Machinery Regulation can be obtained from TÜV SÜD by sending an email to: .