Assessment of Foetal Exposure to the Homogeneous Magnetic Field Harmonic Spectrum Generated by Electricity Transmission and Distribution Networks

During the last decades studies addressing the effects of exposure to Extremely Low Frequency Electromagnetic Fields (ELF-EMF) have pointed out a possible link between those fields emitted by power lines and childhood leukaemia. They have also stressed the importance of also including in the assessment the contribution of frequency components, namely harmonics, other than the fundamental one. Based on the spectrum of supply voltage networks allowed by the European standard for electricity quality assessment, in this study the exposure of high-resolution three-dimensional models of foetuses to the whole harmonic content of a uniform magnetic field with a fundamental frequency of 50 Hz, was assessed. The results show that the main contribution in terms of induced electric fields to the foetal exposure is given by the fundamental frequency component. The harmonic components add some contributions to the overall level of electric fields, however, due to the extremely low permitted amplitude of the harmonic components with respect to the fundamental, their amplitudes are low. The level of the induced electric field is also much lower than the limits suggested by the guidelines for general public exposure, when the amplitude of the incident magnetic field is set at the maximum permitted level.