ACMA audit reassures 5G is safe

The Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (AMTA) welcomes the release of the latest Australian Media and Communications Authority (ACMA) Electromagnetic Energy (EME) audits which again confirm that the EME levels from mobile base stations with 5G enabled are very low.

Following its 2021 audit program in Victoria, the ACMA has undertaken a similar program examining 129 base stations across NSW.  The results of the measurements by ACMA in NSW were similar to those found in Victoria in 2021.  The audit found the average EME levels from all technologies including 3G, 4G and 5G across 129 base stations was less than 1.2% of the public safety limits and the majority of sites were under 1%.

The ACMA audit also compared the measured values to those reported by Carriers in the ARPANSA Environmental EME Report prepared for all mobile base station sites in Australia and available on AMTA’s Radiofrequency National Site Archive (the RFNSA). In all cases the measured values from the ACMA audit were below the Carriers’ predictions and in the vast majority of cases were less than half the levels reported on the RFNSA.

The audit also found that carriers are meeting their obligations under the Mobile Base Station Deployment Code’s consultation requirements. The Code ensures local community, councils, property owners and occupiers, and community members in sensitive locations are being notified and consulted before construction of new or upgraded mobile network infrastructure.

Importantly, in addition to the reports, the ACMA have now developed a publicly accessible portal, EME Checker, which allows members of the public to find the average EME from mobile phone towers in the tested areas. The portal is populated with the results from the ACMA 5G audit measurements and will be added to as the ACMA completes further audit programs over time.

For further information, refer to the following ACMA reports on their 5G compliance audits for 2022.

EME near 5G mobile base stations

5G mobile phone base station deployment: Carrier notification and consultation requirements