STANAG 2345 personnel exposure to electric and electromagnetic fields

What it is

STANAG 2345 is the NATO Standardization Agreement covering personnel exposure to electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields in military workplaces, over the frequency range its own title states: 0 Hz to 300 GHz. This is Edition 4, promulgated 26 November 2015, superseding Edition 3.

A STANAG built around a civil standard, not an Allied Publication

Most STANAGs cover a NATO Allied Publication: an AQAP, an AEP, an AMedP. STANAG 2345 does something different. Participating nations agree to implement the following standard, and the standard it names is IEEE C95.1-2345-2014, a publication of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, obtained from IEEE on IEEE's own terms rather than through NATO. The STANAG itself sets out no exposure limits, reference levels or technical thresholds of its own; those live in IEEE C95.1-2345-2014, and anyone actually assessing a workplace against them needs that publication, not this cover agreement.

What nations agree to

The stated aim is interoperability: to protect personnel engaged in NATO operations in military environments against established adverse health effects from exposure to electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields, induced and contact current, and contact and arcing voltages, for incorporation into a personnel protection safety program. A nation may implement the covered standard's environmental exposure levels individually or in full, but the text is explicit that consistent restrictions still apply once personnel from different nations are working together, to keep multinational activities interoperable.

Who it binds, and how

STANAG 2345 binds nations, not companies. It becomes effective for a nation through ratification, tracked in the NATO Standardization Document Database (NSDD) separately from implementation: nations examine their own ratification and advise the NATO Standardization Office of their implementation intentions, and partner nations receive a standing invitation to adopt the STANAG rather than an obligation to ratify it. Nations and partner nations report their progress using dedicated annexes of AAP-03(J): Annex H for nations, Annex G for partner nations. A defence contractor meets STANAG 2345, or the standard it covers, only where a contract or a customer's own safety programme requires it; the document sets no obligation reaching a supplier directly.

How it's evaluated

STANAG 2345 describes no certification scheme and no audit of its own. What it describes is nations reporting their ratification and implementation status to NATO for the record. Where a facility's own field-exposure programme is checked in practice, the assessor and the evidence required come from the contract's quality clause or the customer's safety requirements, not from this STANAG.

Standards it references

STANAG 2345 covers IEEE C95.1-2345-2014, the civil publication that actually sets the exposure requirements. Its "Other Related Documents" list adds IEEE Std C95.7-2005 (a recommended practice for radio-frequency safety programs), STANAG 1379 (the NATO RADHAZ warning sign), STANAG 1380 (the NATO Naval Radio and Radar Radiation Hazards Manual, paired with AECP-02), STANAG 3680 (which covers AAP-06, NATO's glossary of terms and definitions), Council Directive 92/58/EEC on health and safety signs at work, and ISO 3864 on graphical safety symbols and colours - the last two naming the warning-sign side of the programme rather than the exposure requirements themselves. Separately, AAP-03 is named only as the publication carrying the national reporting-form annexes, not as a technical reference on field exposure.

Standards it references

• STANAG 1380Background
• AECP-02Background
• STANAG 3680Background