Chemical Testing
Chemical Compliance Testing for Global Market Access
Substance restriction testing for RoHS, REACH, POPs, California Proposition 65, and national equivalents. Electrical safety evidence is scoped separately under electrical safety testing.
Two questions, one file
What is the product made of, and does it perform the way the standard requires?
Chemical and electrical testing answer two different questions that regulators increasingly ask together. The chemical question is about substances: does the product contain lead, cadmium, mercury, hexavalent chromium, certain phthalates, brominated flame retardants, PFAS, or other restricted materials above the thresholds a market allows? The electrical question is about performance: does the product meet the input, output, insulation, leakage, and construction requirements the applicable standard sets?
Both questions are answered with evidence from a laboratory. Both are only as good as the scope behind them. A RoHS test on the wrong homogeneous material tells you nothing about the part that fails. An electrical test on a sample with a different power supply describes a different product.
ORBIS Compliance scopes both kinds of testing as part of Product Compliance Testing and Management, so the chemical file and the electrical file describe the same product, are accepted by the same markets, and stay current as your supply chain changes.
Chemical and substance compliance
The restriction regimes that touch most manufactured products
EU RoHS and global equivalents
Restriction of hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment, with parallel regimes in China, Korea, India, the UK, Eurasia, and other markets that each define scope and exemptions differently.
REACH and SVHC obligations
Registration, authorization, restriction, and substance-of-very-high-concern communication duties for articles placed on the EU market, with UK REACH running in parallel.
POPs, PFAS, and emerging restrictions
Persistent organic pollutants, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, and the growing list of national restrictions that arrive faster than most supplier declarations are updated.
California Proposition 65
Warning requirements for listed chemicals in products sold in California, a labeling obligation that many global manufacturers discover through an enforcement notice.
Packaging and heavy metals
Heavy-metal limits in packaging, coatings, and inks under EU, US state, and other packaging directives that apply regardless of the product inside.
Toy, textile, and contact materials
Migration and content limits for products used by children, worn on the body, or in contact with food and drinking water, which carry their own test methods and thresholds.
Electrical testing
Performance evidence the safety and EMC files depend on.
Electrical testing covers the measurements that show a product behaves within its ratings: input power and current, output characteristics, dielectric strength, insulation resistance, leakage and touch current, earthing continuity, temperature rise, and the behavior of protective devices. Some of these are standalone requirements. Most are embedded in the safety standards each market applies, and several feed directly into energy efficiency declarations.
The recurring problem is component substitution. A cost-down changes a capacitor, a transformer, or a power supply after the test, and the report no longer describes the product. ORBIS locks the electrical construction that the report depends on and tells you which changes need a re-evaluation before they reach production.
For products entering markets with their own electrical safety marks, the electrical measurements are usually reused across schemes. We scope them once, at a laboratory recognized by each target market, so the same data serves every certificate.
Supplier declarations versus testing
When paperwork is enough, and when it isn't.
Substance compliance is often documented through supplier declarations and material data rather than testing every part. That's legitimate when the documentation holds. It's a liability when it doesn't.
Relying on declarations alone
What matters
A managed chemical file
Declarations cite an old RoHS annex or omit newer restrictions such as phthalates or PFAS.
COVERAGE
Declarations are reviewed against the current restriction list per market, and gaps are tested.
The declaration names a part family, not the exact part number on your BOM.
TRACEABILITY
Every declaration or test result is tied to the specific material and part in the product.
A supplier substitutes a material and nobody updates the file.
CHANGE
Supplier changes trigger a review, and screening is used where the risk warrants it.
An authority asks for evidence and the team forwards a PDF nobody has read.
DEFENSIBILITY
The file shows what was declared, what was tested, and who reviewed it.
Questions
Chemical and electrical testing
Do we have to test every component for RoHS?
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No. Most manufacturers combine supplier declarations, material data, and risk-based screening. Testing is targeted at high-risk materials, parts without adequate documentation, and cases where a market's authority expects test evidence. ORBIS designs that mix for your product and markets.
Our product is RoHS compliant in the EU. Does that cover China and other markets?
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Partly. China RoHS, Korea RoHS, India's e-waste rules, UK RoHS, and Eurasian restrictions share the core substance list but differ in scope, exemptions, labeling, and documentation. A compliant EU product often needs additional labeling or declarations elsewhere. We map those differences for your markets.
How do chemical requirements affect our launch timeline?
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Substance testing has lead times, and gathering supplier declarations across a long bill of materials can take longer than the tests. Starting the chemical file during the pre-compliance assessment keeps it off the critical path.
Know what's in the product before a market asks.
Bring the bill of materials, the supplier declarations you have, and the markets. We'll tell you where the documentation holds, where testing is needed, and how to keep it current as suppliers change.
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