Today, the U.S. faces an important question: how to ensure the safety of autonomous vehicles before they become commonplace on our roads. Given how many companies are developing AVs, AV-adjacent technologies and AV programs across industries, answers to that question may vary depending on your knowledge of or stake in the field. As the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gathers public input on the issue, the competing approaches to AV safety are becoming more obvious—and have the potential to create serious challenges.
Competing and misaligned AV standards will impact consumers determining which brands to buy in which regions, policymakers attempting to unify regulations, and transit agencies and transportation companies looking to add AVs to their fleets. This is in addition to the impact on the AV industry itself, which will have to conform to various safety standards based on these multiple safety approaches while also responding to the latest international industry standards set by organizations such as the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, or IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional organization and an internationally respected standards body. If NHTSA’s and IEEE’s approaches differ on a fundamental level, confusion about the way in which we evaluate the performance of automated vehicles may make it difficult for consumers and agencies to evaluate AVs or justify purchases. Such differences may also prevent U.S. safety standards from aligning with standards in the rest of the world.
A solution to this problem exists: embrace the approach already taken by experts—scholars, engineers, automakers and industry representatives—who came together to develop a technology-neutral safety standard. The forthcoming IEEE P2846 standard provides a valuable framework for familiar driving scenarios, such as car-following, driving adjacent to other road u ..
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