GB/T 35973-2018Environmental technical requirements for containers (English PDF)

Foreword

This standard was drafted in accordance with the rules given in GB/T 1.1-2009.

This standard was proposed by and is under the jurisdiction of the National Technical Committee on Freight Containers of Standardization Administration of China (SAC/TC 6).

The drafting organisations of this standard are the Water Transport Science Research Institute of the Ministry of Transport, CIMC Containers Holding Company Limited, Shenzhen Jiada High-Tech Industrial Development Company Limited, China Railway Container Transport Company Limited and Guangzhou Jitai Chemical Company Limited.

It was issued on 6 February 2018 by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine together with the Standardization Administration of the People's Republic of China, and has been in force since 1 September 2018. The /T in the designation marks it as a recommended national standard.

1 Scope

China's national environmental standard for the freight container itself, rather than for what travels inside it. A container is built in enormous numbers, is painted inside and out, is floored with timber and is sealed along every joint, and each of those operations has historically been done with the cheapest available material: solvent-borne paint that releases volatile organic compounds during manufacture and for months afterwards, tropical hardwood plywood cut from forests that cannot be replanted at that rate, and adhesives and sealants that continue to give off formaldehyde and benzene into a closed steel box. The box is then loaded with foodstuffs. This standard sets the environmental technical requirements for containers and the corresponding inspection methods, working on three fronts: it limits the harmful substances in the coatings applied to the inner faces, the outer faces, the floor and the underframe; it directs the flooring towards bamboo, bamboo and timber composites, fast-growing timber, plastics and composite materials and away from tropical hardwood, and requires floor and floor-nail surface coatings suited to the safe carriage of food; and it caps free formaldehyde, benzene, toluene plus xylene and total volatile organic compounds in the sealant used inside the box. It applies to the general purpose freight containers defined in GB/T 5338, and containers of other types may refer to it. Container builders, the shipping lines and leasing companies that buy them and the laboratories that test the materials are the users.

This standard specifies the environmental technical requirements for containers and the corresponding inspection methods.

This standard applies to the general purpose freight containers defined in GB/T 5338; containers of other types may be used with reference to it.

2 Normative references

The following documents are indispensable for the application of this document. For dated references, only the edition cited applies. For undated references, the latest edition (including all amendments) applies.

GB/T 1992 Freight containers - Terminology

GB 18582 Indoor decorating and refurbishing materials - Limit of harmful substances of interior architectural coatings

GB 18583 Indoor decorating and refurbishing materials - Limit of harmful substances of adhesives

HJ 571 Technical requirement for environmental labelling products - Wood based panels and finishing products

HJ 2537 Technical requirement for environmental labelling products - Waterborne coatings

3 Terms and definitions

The terms and definitions given in GB/T 1992 and the following apply to this document.

4 General requirements

4.1 Renewable materials should be used in the manufacture of containers, and the use of non-renewable resources should be reduced.

4.2 The raw materials used in the manufacture of containers shall be favourable to recovery and re-use.

4.3 For the structural parts used in the manufacture of containers, provided the overall quality is not affected, a structural design favourable to repair and to dismantling should be considered, so as to reduce the effort of the recovery operation.