EPAC Standard Document for e-Bikes Now Available

BRUSSEL, Belgium - Next week, on April 30, 2009 the EN 15194 standard for ‘Electronically Power Assisted Cycles’ (EPAC) will be officially announced by the National Standards Boards (NSB’s) of 30 countries (27 EU member states and Iceland, Norway and Switzerland of the European Free Trade Association).

The complete document with all the technical requirements as well as all the test procedures of this new standard is now available at the National Standards Boards of the following countries: Estonia, Latvia, Malta, Ireland, Austria, Sweden and Slovenia. The price for the complete document stands at about €70.

The National Standards Boards of the other 20 member states of the 27 countries that form the European Union, as well as the three European Free Trade Association countries will have the EN 15194 document available before July 31st 2009.

The new standard for ‘Electronically Power Assisted Cycles’ is expected to be the major topic at next month’s China International Bicycle & Motor Fair, better knows as the Shanghai Show which takes place from May 4 – 7, 2009. China is the world’s biggest producer of e-Bikes and has the world’s biggest market for electric bicycles where total 2008 sales stood at 21 million units and an export to various countries that increased 80% to 580,000 complete e-Bikes.

As it stands now the EPAC standard will, contrary to the CEN Safety Standards for bicycles, not be published in the Official Journal of the European Union and with that come into force. The EPAC standard comes into force with the publication by the National Standards Boards. This means that the EPAC standard is now already in force in Estonia, Latvia, Malta, Ireland, Austria, Sweden and Slovenia where the National Standards Boards have published them. At all other countries the EPAC standard comes into force when the National Standards Boards publishes it. As said that publication must take place before July 31st 2009.

According to Chairman Siegfried Neuberger of the CEN Technical Committee 333 that next to standards for bicycles also handled the EPAC standard, the legal status of EN 15194 is a bit lower compared to the CEN standards for bicycles in reference to the General Product Safety Directive (GPSD) of the European Union.

This Directive says that: “Producers shall be obliged to place only safe products on the market.” Paragraph 2 of article 3 of the GPSD describes the legal status of EN 15194. It states that: “The conformity of a product to the general safety requirement shall be assessed by taking voluntary national standards transposing relevant European standards into account.”

To get the EPAC standard on the same harmonised European Norm level as with the standards for bicycles, committee chairman Neuberger says the European Committee for Standardization entered into discussions with the European Commission. With that the publication in the Official Journal of the European Union could follow on a later date.

Sixth months after the EPAC standard announcement all the European and EFTA National Standards Bodies will have implemented the EPAC standard as national standard and any previous national standards shall be withdrawn before this date. This date is July 31st 2009. The implementation of the EPAC standard varies by country. In some European countries it is compulsory by law. These countries are (as far as Bike Europe knows at this moment) France and the UK. In other countries it is part of the European product safety ruling.

• For related items on EPAC, click here
• To download the full text of the EN 15194 standard, click here