Lighting Poles for Greece: Which Specification a Tender Actually Cites

A Greek tender does not usually cite EN 40 directly – it cites a Greek technical specification that cites nine parts of EN 40. The document is ELOT TP 1501-05-07-02-00:2009, “Road lighting columns and luminaires”, published in the Government Gazette on 23 December 2009 under ICS 93.080.40. Its normative references list ELOT EN 40-1, 40-2, 40-3-1, 40-3-2, 40-3-3, 40-5, 40-6, 40-7 and 40-9, together with ELOT EN ISO 1461 for hot-dip galvanizing. A supplier who can name that specification is speaking the language the tender was written in.

Artay Lighting has cast aluminium in its own die-cast foundry in Istanbul since 1999 and exports to more than 33 countries. This page sets out which document a Greek project cites, what CE marking requires, how the customs union with Türkiye actually works at the border, and what changes on an island.

Which document does a Greek tender actually cite?

ELOT TP 1501-05-07-02-00:2009 is a Greek national technical specification, issued by the Hellenic Organization for Standardization, and it is the layer between the European standard and the tender document. Rather than restating EN 40, it adopts it by reference – which is why a bid that answers EN 40-5 alone can still be incomplete against a Greek specification that also expects 40-3-1 and 40-3-3 to have been satisfied.

The practical reading is that EN 40-3-3, verification by calculation, is where most of the work sits. A steel column can be verified by test or by calculation; on a project with several heights and arm configurations, calculation is the only route that scales. Ask for the calculation, at the wind velocity the project states, rather than for a generic type-test certificate.

Is CE marking required, and under which regulation?

Greece is an EU Member State, so the Construction Products Regulation applies directly, and EN 40-5 is a harmonised standard – it was prepared under a mandate given to CEN by the European Commission and EFTA, and it carries the Annex ZA that establishes CE marking and labelling. A steel lighting column placed on the Greek market therefore needs CE marking and a Declaration of Performance.

The regulation behind it changed recently, and it is worth knowing where the ground currently is. Regulation (EU) 2024/3110 took effect on 8 January 2026 and repealed Regulation (EU) 305/2011 on that date; harmonised standards listed under the 2011 regulation and in force on 8 January 2026 remain valid until withdrawn by the Commission, with provisions of the old regime reported to run as far as 2040. In other words the transition is long and EN 40-5 has not stopped being the reference. We are reporting this from a legal briefing rather than from the regulation’s transitional articles, so confirm the position for the specific placing-on-the-market date if it matters commercially.

What does the customs union actually do at the border?

The EU-Türkiye Customs Union rests on Association Council Decision 1/95 of 22 December 1995 and has been in force since 1 July 1996. Its scope covers products other than agricultural products and coal and steel products – that is, industrial products, which is where a lighting column sits. Free circulation is evidenced by the A.TR movement certificate.

Two points people get wrong. First, A.TR is not a certificate of origin. It proves that goods are in free circulation within the customs union; it says nothing about where they were made. Where origin matters – for a public tender’s origin rules, for example – it has to be evidenced separately. Second, the paperwork has changed: since 8 July 2024 the EU and Türkiye accept A.TR certificates issued electronically, bearing a QR code and without a wet-ink signature. If a freight forwarder is still insisting on a stamped paper original, they are working from an old procedure.

What changes on an island?

Three things, and only one of them is corrosion. ISO 12944-2 classifies corrosivity by category – C3 covers coastal areas with low salinity, C4 coastal areas with moderate salinity, C5 coastal areas with high salinity, and CX offshore areas and subtropical atmospheres. No standard assigns a category to a named island; the specification writer names it and the coating system follows. What the coating has to survive, and how fixings, base details and cable entry behave in chloride, is set out in the coastal lighting poles guide.

The other two are logistical and they change the design rather than the finish. Delivery is by ferry, so pole length, packing and lifting arrangements have to suit a ro-ro deck and whatever crane exists at the other end – which is an argument for cast aluminium below 6 m, where a pole can be handled without heavy plant. And maintenance access is expensive: a replacement part that takes three weeks and a ferry booking is a different proposition from one that takes a van. That is a reason to specify a bolted flange base rather than a root-mounted pole, so a damaged column can be swapped rather than excavated.

How are Greek lighting tenders published?

Through two systems. ESIDIS, the National Electronic Public Procurement System, at portal.eprocurement.gov.gr, is where the procedure runs. KIMDIS, the Central Electronic Registry of Public Contracts, is the publication registry and is searchable without a login through gov.gr. Documents are in Greek.

That last point is worth taking seriously rather than treating as an inconvenience. Greek specifiers search and tender in Greek, and a supplier whose entire technical documentation exists only in English is invisible at the stage where a shortlist is drawn up – not at the stage where a bid is evaluated.

What can Artay supply for a Greek project?

Hot-dip galvanized steel poles to EN ISO 1461, up to 12 m, fabricated to the EN 40 series and verified by calculation under EN 40-3-3 at the wind velocity the project states; and cast aluminium poles, bollards and luminaire housings from our own foundry in Başakşehir, Istanbul, in EN AC-46000 (AlSi9Cu3) alloy with chromate pre-treatment before electrostatic powder coating. Luminaires are CE marked, and manufacturing is certified to TSE under TS EN 40 for lighting columns and to ISO 9001 for quality management. Ask for the certificate together with its scope – a certificate covering luminaires does not cover columns, and the two are routinely confused in tender documents.

We do not make high-mast poles, and we buy in extruded aluminium profile rather than extruding it ourselves, as most of this market does. What we do make from nothing is a form: because the aluminium is cast rather than fabricated, a harbour front or a restored square can have a pole of its own. A new die is cut in our own tool shop in four to six weeks and a first delivery follows seven to nine weeks after drawing approval; repeat orders on that die ship in three weeks. Changing only height, diameter, wall thickness, arm length or RAL colour needs no die at all and carries no minimum order.

Our decorative range is also, unusually, named after the archaeological sites of western Anatolia – Ephesus, Miletus, Aphrodisias, Xanthos, Sardis – which are the same Hellenistic and Roman settlements a Greek specifier already knows. The models are listed in the ancient cities collection.

Send a drawing, a tender specification or a written requirement to info@artaylighting.com and we will return a technical drawing, a wind-load calculation and a delivery date.

Related guides

• Coastal lighting poles – chloride, corrosivity categories, fixings and cable entry.
• Ancient cities collection – fifty models named after ancient Anatolian settlements.
• Street lighting pole types – the four families, and how a galvanized steel pole is made.
• Lighting poles for Georgia – zero duty, diagonal cumulation and a very wet coast.
• OEM and private label manufacturing – tooling cost, minimum order and lead times in writing.
• Lighting poles for Croatia – HRN EN editions, the exact date CE marking became mandatory, and designing for the bura.
• The EN 40 series explained – which part does what, which one carries CE marking, and what EN 40 leaves to other standards.