# Corded power tool (drill, circular saw)

> The highest hand-held power-frequency fields measured in a household set: circular saws reached 1,000 mG (100 µT) at 15 cm and 300 mG (30 µT) at 30 cm, with drills roughly five times lower.

- Canonical URL: https://emfbase.com/emitters/corded-power-tool
- Collection: Sources & emitters
- Record id: `emitters:corded-power-tool`
- Status: verified
- Last verified: 2026-08-12
- JSON: https://emfbase.com/api/emitters/corded-power-tool
- Also known as: power drill EMF, circular saw EMF, power tool EMF

## Key values

- **Category:** elf magnetic
- **Emission bands:** Power frequency
- **Environments:** home, workplace
- **Duty cycle:** Seconds to minutes per cut or hole; total daily exposure is short for occasional use and substantial for trade use.

## Field strength by distance

- **15 cm:** 50–1,000 mG — Measured range — Measured range at 15 cm in the EPA's 1992 survey of 60 Hz appliances, across power saws (50–1,000 mG / 5–100 µT) and drills (100–200 mG / 10–20 µT). [nrc-1997-appliance-fields, epa-1992-appliance-fields]
- **30 cm:** 9–300 mG — Measured range — Measured range at 30 cm across saws (9–300 mG / 0.9–30 µT) and drills (20–40 mG / 2–4 µT). [nrc-1997-appliance-fields, epa-1992-appliance-fields]

## Mitigations, most effective first

- **For trade-frequency use, treat this as an occupational exposure and compare against the occupational reference level rather than a public one.** — ICNIRP sets a separate, higher occupational reference level for an informed and supervised workforce; the public value does not apply to a working day.
- **Hold the tool by the handle as designed rather than bracing a hand or forearm over the motor housing.** — The motor is the source; a few centimetres of separation from the housing changes the reading substantially.

## Measure with

- ELF gaussmeter (power-frequency magnetic field)

## Related records

- [Household background magnetic field (50/60 Hz)](https://emfbase.com/emitters/household-background-magnetic-field): Away from appliances, homes typically sit below a few milligauss; the WHO's epidemiological association with childhood leukaemia begins at a daily average of 3–4 mG (0.3–0.4 µT).
- [ICNIRP 2010 occupational magnetic field reference level at 50/60 Hz](https://emfbase.com/limits/icnirp-occupational-magnetic-field-50-60-hz): 1000 µT (10,000 mG) for workers — five times the public reference level, on the basis that an occupational population is informed, trained and supervised. It does not apply to the public or to a home.

## Sources

- `nrc-1997-appliance-fields` National Research Council (US), National Academies Press (1997). *Possible Health Effects of Exposure to Residential Electric and Magnetic Fields, Table 2-3: magnetic-field strengths of common household appliances*. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK232734/table/ttt00003/ — peer-reviewed, link checked 2026-08-12
- `epa-1992-appliance-fields` U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Radiation and Indoor Air (1992). *EMF in Your Environment: Magnetic Field Measurements of Everyday Electrical Devices (EPA 402-R-92-008)*. https://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyPURL.cgi?Dockey=000005EP.TXT — government, link checked 2026-08-12

Data licence: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Dataset version 2026.08.1. Retrieved from EMFBase, https://emfbase.com.

This record is reference data, not medical or legal advice. Regulatory limits, scientific guidelines and precautionary values are labelled separately and answer different questions.