Within the framework of the Accreditation Service for laboratories, SIT - Servizio di taratura in Italia (Italian Accreditation Service for Calibration Laboratories) continues to perform its activity of granting accreditation to calibration laboratories in Italy and abroad, an activity that began in 1977. SIT operates in compliance with ISO/IEC 17011 and its autonomy from other INRIM activities is stated in the Organization Rules of INRIM, approved by the competent Ministry. After the re-organization completed at the end of 2004, SIT carries out the accreditation of calibration laboratories, for every metrological sector, and its Head issues the accreditation attestations, whatever type of accredited calibrations the laboratories carry out. This activity is notified by the decrees deriving from law no. 273/1991 establishing the National Calibration System (SNT) and SIT is accepted in other countries as one of the signatories of EA-MLA and ILAC-MRA agreements on the free acceptance of foreign calibration certificates.

SIT takes part actively in European and international bodies, such as European co-operation for Accreditation (EA) and International Laboratory Accreditation Co-operation (ILAC). SIT cooperates with both the Italian accreditation bodies SINAL (testing laboratories) and SINCERT (Quality Assurance) and participates in the activity of FIDEA (Federazione Italiana degli Enti di Accreditamento). SIT collaborates in the development of the quality assurance of Italian calibration laboratories, and in the development of quality culture for technicians operating in the laboratories of public and private bodies.

In 2007 SIT extended the network of calibration laboratories. In the Mechanical Area SIT accredited 9 new laboratories, extended the accreditation of 16 laboratories, renewed the accreditation for 29 laboratories, and carried out the program of surveillance visits to 58 laboratories. In the Electrical Area SIT accredited a new laboratory, extended the accreditation of 8 laboratories, renewed the accreditation for 15 laboratories, and carried out the program of surveillance visits to 30 laboratories. During the same period 3 laboratories discontinued SIT accreditation.

Several SIT assessors have participated in courses for metrological experts, organized in cooperation with ANGQ (Rome) and Istituto Guglielmo Tagliacarne (Rome). An internal training course for SIT assessors has been held, in order to extend knowledge of SIT documentation, that has been updated to standards and to the new SIT regulations, and in order to train new SIT assessors.

SIT actively took part in EA activity attending the General Assembly and meeting of Multilateral Agreement Committee and Laboratory Committee. SIT technical assessors were involved in foreign accreditation processes by COFRAC, ENAC and TURKAC.

SIT performed the review of its documentation in order to achieve compliance with ISO 17011. The text of the SIT Regulation was developed, in order to substitute the Agreement for SIT among the three Italian Metrological Institutes dated 1987, after the unification of IMGC and IEN into the new INRIM.

In order to evaluate the calibration capabilities of the calibration laboratories, 92 Interlaboratory comparisons (ILC) were organized grouped as follows:

Lenght	18
Speed	2
Mass and volume	9
Time and frequency	13
High frequency	3
Electrical measurement	6
Temperature and humidity	10
Strength, torque, hardness and pressure	22
Acoustics	4
Chemistry	3

The accreditation activities in the field of calibrations of traffic control instruments were continued and led to the accreditation of a laboratory for the calibration of traffic lights violation indicators. A special technical procedure for time interval measurements was developed by the calibration centre for this purpose.

⁽¹⁾ By kind concession of SIT Calibration Centre no. 101.