Opportunities to Improve Portable Electric Luminaire Compliance

UL wants to help you leverage standard revisions to optimize your product offerings. In some cases, standard revisions allow you to offer new or revised products that previously were not compliant with the standard. For other revisions, designs that were previously considered compliant may require modification and, in some cases, reevaluation to maintain their certification.

For UL 153, the Standard for Portable Electric Luminaires, revisions published July 24, 2020, will affect a variety of product designs and some test programs. The following is not a comprehensive list but identifies several of the key changes.

Revisions with potential product design or investigation impacts:

• USB and Power over Ethernet (PoE) powered portable luminaires do not need to be supplied with or marked to identify a compatible power supply, due to the standardized ratings of these input connector designs.
• Some task-oriented portable luminaires, such as illuminated makeup mirrors, no longer require evaluation to UL 962, the Standard for Household and Commercial Furnishings.
• Undercabinet (and similar) portable luminaires intended for series interconnection can now be marked to identify the maximum number of identical units or the maximum connected load (in amps or watts). This will allow the mixing and matching or similar, but not identical, luminaires.
• Portable luminaires with multicell rechargeable batteries will require an additional fault test, but two other battery-related tests have been eliminated. Batteries known to comply with Part 1 or Part 2 of IEC/UL 62133,  the Standard for Secondary Cells and Batteries Containing Alkaline or Other Non-Acid Electrolytes - Safety Requirements for Portable Sealed Secondary Cells, and for Batteries Made from Them, for Use in Portable Applications, are now eligible for use, in addition to those known to comply with UL 2054, the Standard for Household and Commercial Batteries, or UL 1642, the Standard for Lithium Batteries.
• Portable luminaires with a screwshell lampholder but intended for use with only self-ballasted LED or fluorescent lamps are not required to additionally be marked with a maximum incandescent lamp rating.
• Portable luminaires intended to be mounted to a bed headboard must include installation instructions to warn against cord damage.
• Hand lights that remain undamaged as a result of the drop tes, and with no accessible surfaces that exceed 90 degrees Celsius no longer require a lamp guard.
• Product instructions can now be provided on a website rather than packaged with the portable luminaire if the luminaire is marked or provided with the website address.
• Some lamp replacement markings can be further abbreviated to save space.

UL’s customers are welcome to contact us to take action on any items that may affect UL Certified products. Our goal is to help you expand and solidify your market position by working with the global leader in safety science.