Glass in building

Glass in building

The GGF Technical Department in conjunction with the GGF Standards Committee has issued a status report relating to the revision of the Harmonized European Standards (hens) to comply with the Construction Products Regulation (CPR).

With the publication of the CPR the European Commission has requested that the CEN Technical Committees examine their hENs to ensure that they are compliant with the new legislation.

The major work revolves around converting the Annex ZA’s. New Annex ZA’s needed to cover the following:

1. Replace “Declaration of Conformity”(DoC) with the “Declaration of Performance” (DoP)
2. Change “System of Attestation of Conformity” to the new “Assessment and Verification of Constancy of Performance” (AVCP)
3. With the DoP there is nothing to cover “durability”. Therefore there was a need to define another “Essential Characteristic/Works Characteristic’ that could then be included in the DoP

At the same time, the Commission asked that there be changes in the manner that the hEN’s are drafted. Also, they altered the system of consultants. This system is under the control of Ernest and Young. The new Harmonised Standards (HAS) consultants have been employed to operate this new system. When a draft harmonized standard is ready for assessment it is referred to Ernest and Young who pass it onto one of the consultants. There are only FOUR consultants covering all of the standards under the CPR.
{none of the four CPR consultants has a background in glass}

WHERE WE ARE

Published standards awaiting Citation in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU)

The following “product standards” have been published and sent for official citation:

• hEN 1096 – 4: Glass in building – Coated glass – Part 4: Product standard
• hEN 1279 – 4: Glass in building – Insulating glass units – Part 5: Product standard

According to CEN our two standards were part of a package of seven to be cited.

The initial expectation within CEN and the technical committee (CEN TC129) was they would go through the citation process during Autumn 2018 that then became the end of 2018. The latest information is the end of the first quarter of 2019. However, there is nothing yet to confirm this timescale.

Standards going through HAS

All of these standards have failed assessment prior to the citation:

• EN 12150 – 2 Glass in building – Thermally toughened soda lime silicate safety glass – Part 2: Product standard
• EN 13024 – 2 Glass in building – Thermally toughened borosilicate safety glass – Part 2: Product standard
• EN 14179 – 2 Glass in building – Heat soaked thermally toughened soda lime silicate safety glass – Part 2: Product standard
• EN -16477 – 2 Glass in building – Painted glass for internal use – Part 2: Product standard

These standards have failed an assessment at ‘enquiry stage’

• prEN 17257 – 2 Glass in building – Acid etched glass – Part 2: Product standard
• prEN 17258 – 2 Glass in building – Sandblasted glass – Part 2: Product standard

The problem with the new consultants is their lack of knowledge on glass products and their insistence that what we stated in our “answer to the mandate” is cast in concrete.

{They are expecting the standard to use exactly the words proposed within the “answer to the mandate” whilst there was nothing stated by the Commission on this topic}

{As far as the specification writers are concerned the “Title and Scope” of the standard are only finally decided when the content is finalized.}

Problems

Our main difficulties are as follows:

1. The time delay between publication of the “Part 1” and the associated product standard, i.e. the “Part 2”. This is, at present, for EN 14179 a delay of three years.

For example:
{EN 14179 – 1: 2016  Glass in building – Heat soaked thermally toughened soda lime silicate safety glass – Part 1: Definition and description include a revised “heat soaking process”. This cannot be used until EN 14179 – 2: Glass in building – Heat soaked thermally toughened soda lime silicate safety glass – Part 2: Product standard has been cited.}

{The EN 14179 – Part 1 referenced within the existing Part 2, 2005 is as a dated reference, i.e. 2005, and this is the version that MUST be followed.}

1. The commission has also decided to change the layout of the hEN’s. These changes have been informed to the consultants but not to the technical specification/standards writers.

These are some examples:

1. All normative references are to be dated references
2. Certain clause titles, for example, Requirements, are no longer permitted
3. The Annex ZA needs to be modified. The version that the consultant’s reference is not the one that the specification writers are aware of.
4. Add a definition of “Durability” and then add it to the list of essential characteristics. Develop a methodology for all product groups that are sufficiently robust to ensure acceptance by the European Commission.

WHAT NEXT?

HAS Assessments

In order to move the harmonized European standards, that have received ‘negative assessments’, forward the management working group of CEN TC129 has agreed the following:

• Arrange meeting(s) with the HAS consultant(s) to educate them on glass and subsequently agree on how to modify the existing text.
• Undertake the development of an updated answer to the mandate. This will cover all of the product groups and will be based on the 2016/17 version that has recently received commission acceptance.
• Completely redraft the standard and then send it to the CEN process. Hopefully, this will only require a new formal vote.

With respect to the two standards that were assessed at the enquiry stage the following has been agreed:

• CEN will contact the consultant who did the assessment and request that he checks his findings against the recently accepted 2016/17 answer to mandate.
• The applicable working group will when considering the comments from the public enquiry also incorporate into the draft, for a formal vote, the assessment suggestions.

Timing

Develop, an agreement, with CEN and the Commission that will ensure that the Part 1’s and 2’s, i.e. part dealing with the technical detail related to the product and the harmonized product standard part, are published together.

This article will hopefully inform the industry about the present situation.

The future work of CEN TC129: Glass in building will continue to produce new and also revise existing standards that are covered by the official Commission Mandate (M135) Glass in building.

Future work will also include modifications to the appropriate standards that will be necessary to cover the environmental topic “release of dangerous substances to indoor air”.

For more information please contact: technical@ggf.org.uk