Regulatory Compatibility: EU and U.S. Forging Ahead

Together, the EU and the U.S. are working to reduce or eliminate differences in technical regulations, standards, and certifications that cost business and consumers both time and money.

In July, the transatlantic partners took two important steps forward toward enhancing transatlantic compatibility in the regulatory area. On July 17, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology and the EU’s Joint Research Center (JRC) agreed to expand their current scientific cooperation in 10 areas, including energy, environment, food safety, healthcare, nanotechnology, security, and transport.

Just one day later, the EU and U.S. together launched the Interoperability Center for electric vehicles and smart grids at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago. This is the first of two centers designed to foster  interoperability between electric vehicles, smart grids, and recharging systems and allow universal charging of any plug-in vehicle, anytime, anywhere.  The second center will open in the EU in 2014 at two JRC sites—Petten in the Netherlands and Ispra in Italy.

• Read more on the NIST-JRC agreement
• Read more on the Interoperability Center
  

IN THIS CONTEXT You may also be interested in:

• Electric vehicles and smart grids: First EU-US Interoperability Centre opens for business
• E-vehicles and smart grids: First EU-US Interoperability Centre inaugurated
• EU and the US extend scientific co-operation on standards and measurements