Issue link: https://resources.mouser.com/i/1442796
| 26 | ITU-T Recommendations and the Resistibility of Telecommunication Equipment By Tatjana Gazivoda-Nikolic, FAE Central & South Europe, Bourns, Inc. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU-T) developed its ITU-T K Series recommendations to help designers determine the resistibility of telecommunication equipment to withstand the effect of overvoltage or overcurrent events based on a defined level, and to meet specified criterion. These recommendations cover every aspect of the telecommunications system including the components within the system. The most familiar ITU-T K Series recommendations are K.20, K.21 and K.45. In addition to these resistibility tests, there are others that are important to ensure telecom equipment designs are compliant. Therefore, consideration must be given to the selection of the right components in the design of the protection scheme for telecom equipment. Beyond the tests included in the standards, there are many more resources offered by ITU-T that developers may not be aware of. This paper provides an overview of ITU-T Recommendations of resistibility tests for overvoltage and overcurrent events in telecom equipment installed in telecommunication centers, customer premises and in access and trunk networks. To provide further assistance to developers, this paper also presents general protection design guidelines, and solutions available for a particular application. ITU-T and Regional Applicability The ITU-T organization is responsible for studying technical operating and tariff questions and issuing recommendations in these areas with the goal of standardizing telecommunications worldwide. There are many different study groups active in ITU-T, where experts from around the world develop international standards known as ITU-T Recommendations. The recommendations issued by different groups have different prefixes. For the resistibility topics, the Study Group 5 (SG5) work is relevant. This group covers studies on methodologies for evaluating ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) effects on climate change and publishes guidelines for using ICTs in an eco-friendly way. SG5's four main objectives are to: • Protect telecommunication equipment and installations against damage and malfunction due to electromagnetic disturbances, such as those from lightning. • Ensure the safety of personnel and users of networks against current and voltages used in telecommunication networks. • Avoid health risks from electromagnetic fields (EMFs) produced by telecommunication devices and installations.