scope:

This recommended practice presents guidelines and procedures that can form the basis of a radio frequency exposure safety program¹ (RFSP) that provides guidance for controlling hazards associated with radio frequency (RF) sources that operate in the frequency range of 3 kHz to 300 GHz. This is a general-purpose document intended for application in most RF exposure scenarios with the goal of avoiding potentially hazardous exposures to electromagnetic fields, currents, and/or contact voltages. In some complex cases, however, the required elements of an adequate RFSP may exceed those described in this document. In such cases, additional guidance may be necessary to effect a satisfactory RF safety solution. There are many ways of accomplishing the goal of a satisfactory RF safety program. While this recommended practice outlines certain schemes for providing a safe environment for persons who may be exposed to excessive levels of electromagnetic energy, other schemes may be equally effective.

Purpose

These guidelines are provided to assist in the development of RF safety programs for the use of RF energy-producing devices, equipment, and systems, and to control any potentially hazardous exposure of workers or the public. The means for accomplishing this are by first characterizing areas into one of four exposure categories according to the potential risk for exposure above prescribed RF exposure limits, as described in 1.3, then specifying the appropriate controls to reduce the likelihood of over-exposure. For many situations, this guidance will assist in the development of site-specific RF safety programs, while in others the programs may be developed to apply across a wide range of exposure environments. These guidelines are designed to complement the IEEE C95 family of standards on electromagnetic safety, but may find use in the development of effective programs to ensure conformance with other guidelines, standards, or regulations for controlling human exposure to electromagnetic energy. This recommended practice provides guidelines for establishing RF safety programs, but other recommendations may already exist that are deemed sufficient by local regulatory authorities for achieving RF safety in particular environments. Hence, other recommendations could potentially replace or be used in conjunction with the recommendations in this document. Guidelines developed for specific applications, for example, radio amateur operations (see ARRL [B4]²), and electrical transmission/distribution personnel working near mobile phone base-station antennas installed on electric utility structures (see IEEE P1654 [B23]), represent two such examples.

¹For the purposes of this document, the term "RF safety" is a shorthand notation used to mean "RF exposure safety." See definition 3.1.35.

²The numbers in brackets correspond to those of the bibliography in Annex I.