Why RF EMF interlaboratory comparison measurements

One of the most important ways of ensuring the quality of measurement laboratories, especially accredited ones, is participation in interlaboratory comparison measurements (ILC). There is no organized scheme for participation in ILC in the field of EMF, so each laboratory independently organizes and agrees on participation in ILC.

The Institute for Non-Ionizing Radiation has participated in and organized major international ILCs in the past, most recently at the beginning of the 5G mobile network installation. Today, 5G network base stations are already largely in place, and measurement protocols are defined in the IEC 62232 standard, but particularly in the case of base stations with beamforming antennas measurement protocols are challenging. A new method is being developed, expected to be included in the new edition of the IEC 62232 standard.

The purpose of the ILC is to perform the ILC on a real base station according to the IEC 62232:2025 standard. All necessary technical data of base station will be provided to all participants so they can perform measurements using any method from the IEC 62232:2025 standard, either measurements under load (during speed test or file transfer) or as selective measurements.

At the same time, measurements will also be performed using a new method based on measuring the contributions of individual source elements during file transfer and extrapolating to the bandwidth of the system using novel measurement equipment Narda SignalShark with a 5G option. Participants will also be able to observe the new method and the necessary equipment during the ILC and test it.