Mediaroom

The UN World Forum for the Harmonization of Regulations WP.29 hosted its 188th session on 14-16 November in Geneva, with a special focus on the ‘Framework document on vehicle whole-life compliance’.

In this regard, CLEPA welcomes the initiative to further evaluate the level of safety and environmental performance of vehicles, equipment and parts along different stages of their life and to assess if there is the need for new arrangements to demonstrate that vehicles fulfil specific safety or environmental requirements in a given moment of their life, aiming at complementing the existing Type Approval, Conformity of Production, In-Service Conformity, Periodical Technical Inspection and Road-Side Inspection procedures.

During the WP.29 meeting, CLEPA stressed that the proposed project should be developed considering some fundamental guiding principles, including the predominant role of the Contracting Parties to the 1958 and 1998 Geneva Agreements in the evaluation and establishment of the level of safety and environmental performance of vehicles, equipment and parts along different stages of the vehicle life. Following the above assessment, the definition of the specific (new) parameters needed to demonstrate the safety and environmental performances of vehicles shall be conducted by WP.29 and its subsidiary bodies within the context of the 1997 Vienna Agreement and the 1958 and 1998 Geneva Agreements.

Furthermore, CLEPA stressed the importance of confidentiality, IP protection and data security, the need to reduce regulatory efforts to a minimum and avoid duplication of requirements and inconsistencies, without creating new legal obligations that differ from those defined in the scope of type-approval, and taking in due account original and non-original replacement parts that are legally equipped on running vehicles.

Many UN Member States shared the CLEPA recommendation with the result that the WP.29 document has been now sent for a second round of evaluation at its Periodical Technical Inspection WG.