IEC TR 61547-1:2015
IEC TR 61547-1:2015 — Equipment for general lighting purposes — EMC immunity requirements — Part 1: An objective light flickermeter and voltage fluctuation immunity test method
Definition
IEC TR 61547-1:2015 is the international Technical Report that defines a standardized light flickermeter — a model of human perceptual response to light flicker. It produces PstLM, a single-scalar severity number where 1.0 is the visibility threshold. EU Ecodesign references this standard for the SLR (Single Lighting Regulation) PstLM ≤ 1.0 compliance threshold.
Verbatim from the source
“The voltage fluctuation immunity test of the EUT during the test is done in an objective way by using the same Pst flicker metric of the voltage-based flickermeter specified in IEC 61000-4-15. This is done by measuring the illuminance variation of the EUT and applying it to an adapted flickermeter which uses illuminance as input instead of the voltage.”
Technical detail
Annex A is the normative specification of the light flickermeter — block diagram (Figure A.2), filter coefficients (Equations A.1–A.6), and a verification table (Table A.1) of test inputs and expected PstLM values that any conforming implementation must reproduce within tolerance.
Relationship to IEC 61000-4-15:2010 — the older voltage flickermeter spec. IEC TR 61547-1 reuses the perceptual blocks but bypasses the lamp-impulse-response blocks because illuminance is the direct input rather than line voltage.
Caveat (verified analytically by FlickerSpec's reference implementation): Equation A.5 as published has a typographical error — the s³ numerator coefficient is printed as "44 758" but should be 44.758. Conforming implementations must use the corrected value to match the Table A.1 verification vectors.
Frequency validity is 0.3 Hz to ~90 Hz. Above 90 Hz, perceptual flicker behaviour transitions to other regimes (stroboscopic effects below ~2 kHz, phantom-array effects in the eye-saccade band) which are addressed by separate metrics — SVM (CIE TN 006:2016) and PAVM (CIE TR 249:2022).
Where it appears
- FlickerSpec Used here
FlickerSpec's IEC Certified Measurement (Pro tier, iOS) is a conforming implementation of the IEC TR 61547-1:2015 Annex A light flickermeter. The Table A.1 verification vectors all pass within ±5% in the test suite.
Related terms
- PstLM
PstLM is a single-scalar perceptual metric for how annoying flicker from a light source is to a static human observer. PstLM = 1.0 correspon…
- IEEE 1789-2015
IEEE 1789-2015 is an IEEE recommended practice that defines low-risk and no-effect frequency / modulation-depth thresholds for current modul…
- EU Ecodesign SLR
Commission Regulation (EU) 2019/2020 — the Single Lighting Regulation under the Ecodesign framework — sets ecodesign requirements for light …
- SVM
SVM is a perceptual metric for the stroboscopic effect — the apparent stuttering or jagged motion of a moving object under modulated light. …
- PAVM
PAVM is a perceptual metric for the phantom-array effect — the chain of bright dots that appears when a viewer moves their eyes across a hig…