United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN ECE) Regulation No. 100 on the construction and functional safety of battery electric vehicles was originally published in 1996 and, apart from the addition of a test procedure to measure the hydrogen emissions during charging of the vehicle's traction battery in 2002, its requirements have remained largely unchanged until recently.
In 2007, it was recognised that this Regulation needed to be updated to reflect:
- The rapidly developing technology in the area of electric powertrains, especially relating to the battery chemistries being employed, and
- The increasing use of electric powertrains in vehicles other than pure battery electric vehicles, such as hybrid electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles.
To develop the necessary updates to ECE 100, which would form the 01 series of amendments, a specific Working Group on Electrical Safety was set up. This group met seven times between January 2008 and September 2009 and agreed a large number of significant revisions to the Regulation's requirements on protection against electric shock, rechargeable energy storage systems and functional safety, including the introduction of detailed isolation resistance measurement methods.
The final 01 series of amendments to ECE 100, which are effectively a complete rewrite of the Regulation and extend the scope of the Regulation to include all vehicles equipped with an electric traction motor, were officially published on 24th March 2011. Compliance with the requirements of ECE 100.01 becomes mandatory for new types of vehicle from 4th December 2012.