The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently published in the Federal Register its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, amending Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards for rear-view mirrors and visibility.
The U.S. Congress, through the Cameron Gulbransen Kids Transportation Safety Act of 2007, previously had required NHTSA to propose rules for enhancing the visibility of the area immediately behind a vehicle to minimize the likelihood of pedestrians being struck during vehicle back-ups. Following research and review by NHTSA, the details of the proposed rulemaking are now available.
Given the potential impact that the rulemaking would have on the automotive industry by requiring rear-visibility hardware on every vehicle less than 10,000 pounds gross vehicle weight, iSuppli, now part of IHS Inc. (NYSE: IHS), will briefly review the technologies that were tested as potential solutions and share the details specified in the proposed rulemaking that may end up as required features.
Background Statistics
On average, 292 fatalities and 18,000 injuries result from backover crashes each year. Of those, 228 fatalities and 17,000 injuries involved light vehicles such as passenger cars, light trucks, sports utility vehicles (SUV) and vans included in the less than 10,000 pound weight category.
In analyzing the collected crash data, three findings were articulated. First, many accidents occur off public roadways in areas such as driveways and parking lots. Second, when pick-ups and multipurpose vehicles (MPV) strike a pedestrian in a backover crash, the incident is four times more likely to result in death than from those made by a passenger car.
Third, children under 5 years of age represent a uniquely high 44 percent of fatalities. Elderly persons more than 70 years old also account for another large portion of backover fatalities at approximately 33 percent, second only to children 5 years and younger. Common among these two groups—together accounting for 77 percent of such backover deaths—is a general inability of members in the group to quickly move out of the way of a moving vehicle or acknowledge the danger and act to protect themselves. This puts the onus squarely on the driver, the direction in which most safety systems are already oriented.
Technology Solutions
Fortunately, several driver assistance systems already are widely available among these vehicle segments and were the focus of NHTSA’s research in evaluating their effectiveness. The technologies tested include additional mirrors, radar, ultrasonic, and 130- and 180-degree camera sensors.
Several styles of additional mirrors were tested, including rear-mounted interior and at the top rear corner on the driver’s side, similar to U.S. Postal Service vehicles.
Among the conclusions that were reached, NHTSA found that convex mirrors compress and distort images enough to make it difficult for drivers to discern and identify objects effectively. In addition, sensor-based rear-object detection systems, including radar and ultrasonic solutions, were found to be generally inconsistent and unreliable in detecting pedestrians, particularly children. Industry comments state that such sensor-based systems are designed to detect large stationary objects and avoid low objects such as curbs, and algorithms could further be optimized for human detection. NHTSA is aware that further optimization and testing needs to be done, which could propel such systems into mandate-satisfying viability.
The technology that provided the best performance results, however, was the rear-camera park assist, in both 130- and 180-degree formats, with better results coming from wider angles. NHTSA also referred to previous studies, which found that rear-view video systems offer extensive field of vision in depth and width while providing drivers with information about obstacles behind the vehicle in a clear and intuitive way.
Despite camera systems being the most expensive of the tested technologies and future potential for radar-and ultrasonic-based systems, NHTSA concluded that “providing the driver with additional visual information about what is directly behind the driver’s vehicle is the only effective near-term solution at this time to reduce the number of fatalities and injuries associated with backover crashes.”
Deployment and Cost Estimates
Despite the fact that today’s widely available rear-camera park assist systems already likely satisfy these performance specifications, the mandatory installation of such hardware will have significant financial impact on the industry.
iSuppli’s ADAS Technology Availability Calculator shows that 58.9 percent of 2010 models in the United States offer rear-camera park assist as standard or optional equipment, and that number would continue to rise even in the absence of the NHTSA mandate. But the mandate eventually will require installation of the equipment on 100 percent of models and at a much quicker pace.
The original act from Congress requires that full compliance be achieved 48 months after the final rule, expected in February 2011—which means 100 percent availability of such systems by February 2015. To correspond with model year updates, NHTSA advocated annual milestones every Sept. 1, with full compliance scheduled for Sept. 1, 2014.
A rollout of technology on such a massive fleet will be costly. NHTSA estimates that the rear-view camera system will cost from $159 to $203 when installed on a vehicle without an existing display. For a vehicle with an adequate display available—such as the 88 percent of 2010 models, according to iSuppli’s Infotainment Technology Availability Calculator—the price per vehicle would drop to $58. NHTSA estimates the total incremental cost to equip the 16.6 million vehicle fleet to be between $1.9 billion and $2.7 billion.
NHTSA, however, admits that its estimates are on the high side, and most OEM and supplier comments concur. Nonetheless, equipping every new vehicle in the country with not only a camera but also an in-vehicle display will likely remain an uphill sprint.
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