develop consensus standards for use by TNI's programs. This group has a support role in assisting other programs with activities such as guidance and standards interpretation.
fosters the generation of data of known and documented quality is through the National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program, or NELAP. The purpose of this program is to establish and implement a program for the accreditation of environmental laboratories.
is to establish and maintain a national PT program to support TNI’s National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program, and other activities.
Field Activities Program (NEFAP) Executive Committee is to establish and implement an accreditation program for field sampling and measurement organizations (FSMOs).
Audit Sample Program is to develop consensus standards for the manufacture and analysis of audit samples for source emission testing.
on a variety of topics of interest to the environmental measurement community. TNI also hosts two regularly scheduled meetings per year, typically in January and August. Both are a week long and involve open meetings of TNI committees as well as training courses and other special sessions.Standard Interpretation
Standard: 2003 NELAC
Section: 2.5
Link to relevant standard
REQUEST:
Section 2.5 of the 2003 NELAC standard states:
"When analyzing a PT sample, a laboratory shall employ the same calibration, laboratory quality control and acceptance criteria, sequence of analytical steps, number of replicates and other procedures as uses when analyzing routine samples." Questions 3 through 11 of the NELAC checklist contain additional details for this section of the NELAC standard.
1. Are these statements an official interpretation?
2. A laboratory analyzes the PT provider companion quality control sample with the unknown PT sample. The laboratory includes all routine QC, such as blanks, LCS, etc, in the batch. In addition to using the routine QC criteria, the companion QC sample is used to determine the acceptability of the batch containing the PT. This is not a routine practice of the laboratory. Is this considered a finding versus Section 2.5 of the NELAC standard?
TNI FINAL RESPONSE:
(PT Expert Committee/NELAP Accreditation Council, 1-x-11)
1) It is the consensus of the PT Committee that Questions 3-11 are appropriate interpretation of the requirements specified in Section 2.5 of the 2003 NELAC Standard.
2) It is the consensus of the PT Committee that the scenario described in the problem is a finding against Section 2.5 of the NELAC Standard.