STANAG 7230
STANAG 7230 aircraft tolerance to portable electronic devices
Defence aviation suppliers and airworthiness engineers working to a national programme or contract that invokes STANAG 7230 or the AAEP-05 publication it covers
STANAG 7230 is NATO's agreement committing participating nations to implement AAEP-05 Edition A, on demonstrating aircraft electromagnetic tolerance to portable electronic devices.
- Edition
- 1
- Published
- 2021-05-20
What it is
STANAG 7230 is the NATO Standardization Agreement covering aircraft electromagnetic environmental effects (E3) tolerance to portable electronic devices, transmitting and non-transmitting. This is edition 1, promulgated 20 May 2021, and it supersedes no earlier document.
A STANAG is not the specification
A STANAG is the agreement by which NATO nations commit to implement a standard, not the technical specification itself. STANAG 7230's own text is short and administrative: an aim, one interoperability requirement, and the ratification and reporting machinery. The demonstration procedures for aircraft tolerance to portable electronic devices are specified in a separate publication, AAEP-05, Edition A, which the STANAG names as the standard participating nations "agree to implement". Anyone actually running that demonstration needs AAEP-05's own text, not this cover agreement.
What it commits nations to
The stated interoperability requirement is "to address electro-magnetic compatibility (EMC) between portable electronic devices (PEDs, T-PEDs including active RFIDs, and medical related portable electronic devices) and installed aircraft flight and mission electronic equipment and systems for all phases of flight". STANAG 7230 frames this as a response to the proliferation of commercially available portable electronic devices and their radio transmission protocols in aircraft, and it points nations toward existing civil aviation material - RTCA's DO-294 and DO-307, and EUROCAE's ED-118 and ED-130 - as the acceptable means for demonstrating that compatibility, adapted "as necessary to address military specific PEDs, aircraft and equipment".
Who it binds, and how
STANAG 7230 binds nations, not suppliers. It is effective "upon receipt for use by the participating nations and NATO bodies", and it becomes binding on a given nation through ratification, which NATO records in the NATO Standardization Document Database (NSDD). Implementation is described as a further step: nations develop the analysis and test procedures for demonstrating aircraft tolerance to PEDs and T-PEDs, building on the civil material named above. Once implemented, Allies and NATO bodies "shall provide implementation details through the electronic reporting tool". A supplier meets STANAG 7230, or the AAEP-05 procedures it covers, where a national airworthiness programme or a contract says so.
How it's evaluated
STANAG 7230 describes no certification scheme for a supplier or an organisation. What it describes is "the airworthiness authorities of participating nations" addressing "technical airworthiness clearance of PEDs and T-PED technologies against aircraft types" - a clearance granted to an aircraft type by a national authority, not a certificate a company holds. Nations separately report their own ratification and implementation status to NATO through the NSDD.
Standards it references
STANAG 7230 covers AAEP-05, the Allied publication that carries the actual demonstration procedures for aircraft E3 tolerance to portable electronic devices. Its "Other Related Documents" also list AECTP-500 (electromagnetic environmental effects test and verification), alongside RTCA DO-294, RTCA DO-307, EUROCAE ED-118, EUROCAE ED-130 and MIL-STD-464, which sit outside our catalogue. Reviews of STANAG 7230 itself run under AAP-03.
How we help
STANAG 7230 and the AAEP-05 procedures it covers are carried out in aircraft engineering and national airworthiness work, not in a compliance platform: an engineering organisation runs the EMC analysis and test work, and a quality department retains the records that prove the work was done and that a resulting clearance was properly evidenced.
What ComplyTrain does for that kind of work generally is give a defence supplier one auditable place to hold the test and evaluation procedures, the training records for the people running them, and the evidence trail - non-conformances, corrective actions, document control - that a customer's quality representative or a national airworthiness process will ask to see.
ComplyTrain does not run an EMC test, demonstrate an aircraft type's tolerance to portable electronic devices, or grant an airworthiness clearance. That is engineering and national airworthiness authority work, carried out against AAEP-05 and the process it feeds.
Which STANAGs and Allied Publications actually apply to a given aircraft programme is set by the contract and the customer's quality clause, not by us. Browse the explorer to see what sits alongside STANAG 7230 and AAEP-05, and talk to us about the evidence trail once you know which ones are in your contract.
Standards it references
- AECTP-500Background
Questions
Is STANAG 7230 mandatory?
Only where a nation has ratified and implemented it, and it reaches a supplier where a national programme or contract invokes it or the AAEP-05 procedures it covers. The STANAG itself binds nations, not suppliers, directly.
What is the difference between STANAG 7230 and AAEP-05?
STANAG 7230 is the NATO ratification agreement; AAEP-05, Edition A is the publication that specifies the actual analysis and test procedures for demonstrating aircraft E3 tolerance to portable electronic devices. Ratifying STANAG 7230 is how a nation commits to implement AAEP-05.
Can a company be certified to STANAG 7230?
No. STANAG 7230 describes nations ratifying and reporting implementation to NATO, and national airworthiness authorities granting clearance to aircraft types. It names no certification scheme for a supplier or an organisation.
Does STANAG 7230 cover transmitting devices as well as non-transmitting ones?
Yes. Its interoperability requirement names portable electronic devices, "T-PEDs including active RFIDs, and medical related portable electronic devices" without limiting itself to one type.
What edition is current, and what did it replace?
This is edition 1 of STANAG 7230, promulgated 20 May 2021. The document states plainly that "this STANAG does not supersede any document".