The NEW 2011 ANSI/PMMI B155.1 Standard
What's New?
There are many small changes in the new B155.1 standard, but the basic structure of the standard remains unchanged. The following summarizes the changes to the standard.
The Foreword of the standard has been updated to explain how to B155.1 standard compares to the type A/B/C structure used in international standards. B155.1 is primarily an A level standard. The effective date for this revision has also been updated to be six months from the date of publication meaning the requirements will be fully applicable by September 2011. Recall that the effective date for the 2006 publication was 30 months due to the major changes in the standard from a prior version. ANSI/PMMI B155.1 contains the safety requirements for packaging machinery and packaging-related converting machinery. This standard was first published in 1973 with the subsequent editions in 1979, 1986, 1994, in 2000. In 2004 the writing committee began a major revision to the standard to address more fully the requirements of the risk assessment process. The revision integrated the requirements of ISO 12100 parts 1 and 2, and ISO 14121 as well as U.S. standards into a single standard. The intent of the committee was to write a standard that packaging machinery builders could use to "build to one standard, ship anywhere." ISO 12100 was recently published in 2010. This "new" international standard is not as new as one might think. This is the story behind this new standard. In the early 1990s, the European norm (standard ) EN292 Safety of machinery was in trouble. This standard was at risk of never been completed because there were concerns that not enough countries would vote to support publication. As a result the content of the standard was separated into three different standards: EN 292-1 terms and hazard identification, EN 292-2 risk reduction, and EN 1050 risk assessment. As it turned out the political resistance never materialized but by then the three standards had been started and were nearing completion. The standards were published in 1992 and 1995. I am the chair of B11.0 and I'd like to share a bit of its story The genesis of the current document can be traced back to late 1995 and the first meeting of what became ANSI B11 Technical Report #3 or more commonly known as B11 TR3. This meeting kicked off the development of a technical report on risk assessment. This effort was a direct result of the pending publication of EN 1050 on risk assessment in the EU. The purpose of TR3 was to form a single committee to write a US based risk assessment guide that could be used and referenced by the more than twenty B11 standards committees. This precluded each individual standard committee writing its own requirements.
A little bit about ANSI/PMMI B155.1
The story behind the "new" ISO 12100 Safety of Machinery
Out with the old ANSI B11 TR3... in with ANSI B11.0!