2024 SS award WG

EIGA has over 250 experts from Member Companies participating in more than 50 Work Groups. The Working Group Award is given to the Working Group or Ad Hoc Group in recognition of its achievements in quality, effectiveness and team work.

This year, the award goes to AHG-4.10 - ISO TC158
ISO 6142-2 has been published in February 2024. It is now the reference document for the production of industrial calibration gas mixture that replaces ISO 6142:2001 withdrawn with the publication of ISO 6142-1:2015.
Through a lot of work, perseverance, and discussion within the group and with the TC members a solid basis had been created, especially in the description and calculation of batch production. Finally the hard work resulted in the publication of the new standard.

The history of ISO 6142-2 begins in 2011. Four years later, the first part of ISO 6142 had been changed so much, in particular the calculation of measurement uncertainty, that the standard no longer corresponded to the industrial production of calibration gases. Rather, the standard described the approach of the metrological institutes. The German and French mirror committees, together with EIGA, expressed their concerns. That's how the idea of the second part came about.
The creation of this second part has taken quite a while. Not all the members of ISO/TC/WG3 agreed with this new project: it was seen as a potential threat for some members because it provided an alternative ISO reference for the production of industrial calibration mixtures. In addition, because the need for the ISO 6142-2 came from industry, there was no volunteer inside ISO/TC/WG3 to be the project leader of the standard. Therefore the project leader was found in AHG-4.10.
The ISO committee meets usually only twice per year. After every meeting TC members reviewed the draft for comments. All comments (sometimes more than 60 per review) have been discussed in the AHG and the reply agreed by the AHG members.
Through a lot of work and discussion within the group and with the TC members finally a breakthrough was achieved and a solid basis had been created, especially in the description and calculation of batch production. In the meanwhile the project had reached the deadline of a standard ISO process (4 years) and had to be restarted from the administrative beginning stage.
In the end, ISO 6142-2 has been published in February 2024. It is now the reference document for the production of industrial calibration gas mixture that replaces ISO 6142:2001 withdrawn with the publication of ISO 6142-1:2015. The industry has not had a reference document available for more than nine years, but can now use it thanks to the AHG's dogged work to overcome resistance to the document. The chair played an important role in carefully editing the document as well as convincing the panel of ISO TC 158.