Autonomous Vehicles, LEAF and others...

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Via ABG:
Americans say they'd pay about $4,000 extra for self-driving
Some would pay as much as $10,000 for full driving autonomy
http://www.autoblog.com/2017/05/10/americans-say-theyd-pay-about-4-000-extra-for-self-driving/

. . . according to a study by Transportation Research. Drivers are typically willing to fork over a $3,500 premium for partial automation and about $4,900 extra for "full automation," said the report, citing a poll of almost 1,300 Americans. . . .

How successful such automakers will be at fetching those premiums remains in question, though, as older, and often wealthier consumers are less trusting of self-driving technology than are their younger counterparts. According to a study, less than a quarter of Baby Boomers trust autonomous technology, while just 41 percent of Gen X-ers are more willing to put their cars on autopilot than taking the wheel themselves. And more than 55 percent of those qualifying as millennials or younger trust self-driving technology.
Link to paper here: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0968090X17300682
 
This is why Nissan's approach of providing a remote driver will probably be necessary for many years, before full autonomy can be achieved.

The problem with self-driving cars could turn out to be humans

...Although autonomous cars are likely to carry passengers or cargo in limited areas during the next three to five years, experts say it will take many years before robotaxis can coexist with human-piloted vehicles on most side streets, boulevards and freeways. That's because programmers have to figure out human behavior and local traffic idiosyncrasies. And teaching a car to use that knowledge will require massive amounts of data and big computing power that is prohibitively expensive at the moment.

"Driverless cars are very rule-based, and they don't understand social graces," said Missy Cummings, director of Duke University's Humans and Autonomy Lab.

Driving customs and road conditions are dramatically different across the globe, with narrow, congested lanes in European cities, and anarchy in Beijing's giant traffic jams. In India's capital, New Delhi, luxury cars share poorly marked and congested lanes with bicycles, scooters, trucks, and even an occasional cow or elephant.

Then there is the problem of aggressive humans who make dangerous moves such as cutting cars off on freeways or turning left in front of oncoming traffic. In India, for example, even when lanes are marked, drivers swing from lane to lane without hesitation.

Already there have been isolated cases of human drivers pulling into the path of cars such as Teslas, knowing they will stop because they're equipped with automatic emergency braking.

"It's hard to program in human stupidity or someone who really tries to game the technology," says John Hanson, spokesman for Toyota's autonomous car unit.

Kathy Winter, vice president of automated driving solutions for Intel, is optimistic that the cars will be able to see and think like humans before 2030.....
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/11/the-problem-with-self-driving-cars-could-turn-out-to-be-humans.html
 
Big Brother in your car: Self-driving cars will double as security cameras, said Intel CEO Krzanich
CNBC said:
"I always say that the cars are going to be out there looking, so the next time an Amber alert comes up and they're looking for a license plate, the cars should be able to find that license plate quite rapidly," said Krzanich.

The idea could bring up concerns about privacy, but Krzanich has already thought of how to minimize those worries.

"We'll have to put limitations on it," he said. "We'll have to encrypt that data and make sure I can't tell that it's John's [car] necessarily," said Krzanich.
Frankly, encrypting the data does little to quell privacy concerns. It's a pretty ridiculous comment.

So far, airline pilots have managed to keep cameras out of the cockpit. I wonder if consumers will manage to keep them out of their cars. If not, black electrical tape should do the job.
 
Report below that UK drivers will get their first experience with Propilot before we do with the LEAF gen 2:

Updated Nissan X-Trail gets Propilot semi-autonomous technology

Updated SUV will be available to order from August; it’ll get Stage 1 Propilot semi-autonomous technology


...The system, which was launched on the Japan-only Serena MPV last year, still requires drivers to maintain contact with the steering wheel and be ready to retake control should they need to.

Other driver assist programmes include automatic emergency braking with pedestrian recognition, as well as rear cross-traffic alert, which gives visual and audible warnings if the driver is about to reverse into oncoming traffic...
https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/updated-nissan-x-trail-gets-propilot-semi-autonomous-technology
 
Nissan's mass roll-out of AEB will precede Propilot on most USA models, and will be standard equipment on 2018 (gen 2) LEAF, among others:

Nissan to offer standard Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) on one million U.S. vehicles in 2018 model year

Nissan today announced that it is making Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) standard on a projected one million vehicles sold in the United States for model year 2018, including seven of the company's most popular models – Rogue/Rogue Sport, Altima, Murano, LEAF, Pathfinder, Maxima and Sentra (except manual transmission-equipped and all NISMO versions).

AEB (previously known as Forward Emergency Braking) uses radar technology to monitor a vehicle's proximity to the vehicle ahead, giving the driver audible and visual display warnings to help the driver reduce the vehicle's speed if a potential frontal collision is detected. If the driver fails to respond, the AEB system can apply the brakes, helping the driver to avoid the collision or reduce the speed of impact if it is unavoidable.

According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) data, one-third of all police-reported crashes involve a rear-end collision (2013 study). The NHTSA also reports that systems such as AEB can help reduce injury insurance claims by as much as 35 percent (2015 report).

"The big news here is that we're making AEB standard across all grades of our best-selling models," said Michael Bunce, vice president, Product Planning, Nissan North America, Inc. "This increased AEB availability is part of our ongoing commitment to help reduce fatalities while realizing our comprehensive vision of Nissan Intelligent Mobility."

The projected 2018 AEB sales are more than double that of previous model years. It will be offered as standard equipment on 2018 Rogue and Rogue Sport, Altima, Murano, LEAF, Pathfinder, Maxima and Sentra (except manual transmission-equipped and all NISMO versions) models, as well as select Armada models...
http://nissannews.com/en-US/nissan/usa/releases/nissan-to-offer-standard-automatic-emergency-braking-aeb-on-one-million-u-s-vehicles-in-2018-model-year
 
Better late than never?

Honda's new strategy focuses on self-driving cars, EVs

Honda Motor Co. outlined its plans to develop autonomous cars with level 4 capability that can drive on city streets by 2025, building on its strategy to take on automotive rivals of the future.

Unveiling its mid-term Vision 2030 strategy plan on Thursday, Honda said it would boost coordination between r&d, procurement and manufacturing to tame development costs as it acknowledged it must look beyond conventional vehicles to survive in an industry that is moving rapidly into electric and self-driving cars...
http://www.autonews.com/article/20170608/COPY01/306089978/hondas-new-strategy-focuses-on-self-driving-cars-evs
 
Logically, we probably should have autonomous planes before cars.

The same airlines that introduced ~17' wide seats in coach, are probably anxious to get rid of the pilots, so they can open up the prime space for premium-paying concierge class passengers

Boeing studies pilotless planes as it ponders next jetliner

Boeing Co is looking ahead to a brave new world where jetliners fly without pilots and aims to test some of the technology next year, the world's biggest plane maker said in a briefing ahead of the Paris Airshow.

The idea may seem far-fetched but with self-flying drones available for less than $1,000, "the basic building blocks of the technology clearly are available," said Mike Sinnett, Boeing's vice president of product development.

Jetliners can already take off, cruise and land using their onboard flight computers and the number of pilots on a standard passenger plane has dropped to two from three over the years.

Sinnett, a pilot himself, plans to test the technology in a cockpit simulator this summer and "fly on an airplane next year some artificial intelligence that makes decisions that pilots would make", he said.

Self-flying aircraft would need to meet the safety standards of air travel, which had its safest year in 2016, according to the Aviation Safety Network. They would also need to convince regulators who don't yet know how to certify such planes.

"I have no idea how we're going to do that," Sinnett said. "But we're studying it right now and we're developing those algorithms."...
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-boeing-airshow-autonomous-idUSKBN18Z12M
 
Via ABG:
GOP plan for self-driving cars limits federal oversight, cuts out states
http://www.autoblog.com/2017/06/16/gop-plan-for-self-driving-cars-limits-federal-oversight-cuts-ou/
WASHINGTON - California and other states would be barred from setting their own rules governing design and testing of self-driving cars, while federal regulators would be blocked from requiring pre-market approval for autonomous vehicle technology, according to a U.S. House Republican proposal reviewed by Reuters on Thursday. . . .

The industry also opposed an Obama administration proposal last year that raised the possibility of giving regulators the power to review and approve self-driving car technology before it was put into service, similar to the vetting by Federal Aviation Administration of new technology for aircraft.

The 45-page draft package of 14 bills would designate the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration as the lead agency for regulating self-driving cars, pre-empting state rules.

States could still set insurance and registration rules but could not use them as a way to regulate self-driving technologies. California has proposed changes to its self-driving car rules, but automakers said in April it has not gone far enough.

One of the bills in the proposal would allow the U.S. Transportation Department to exempt up to 100,000 vehicles per year from U.S. federal motor vehicle safety rules, which currently prevent the sale of self-driving vehicles without steering wheels, pedals and other human controls.

Another would declare crash data, other testing and validation reports from automated cars turned over to U.S. regulators to be "confidential business information."

U.S. Representative Bob Latta, who chairs a key panel overseeing automobile regulation, called the draft legislation "an important step in establishing a framework to allow innovators to safely develop and test autonomous vehicles. . . ."
IMO, if GOP legislators wish to commit political suicide, passing those bills in their current form would go a long way down that path. There's enough resistance on the part of the public to fully-autonomous vehicles as it is, without allowing companies to hide crash and test data, or use the public as guinea pigs without any prior safety review.
 
Via ABG, a problem that hadn't occurred to me:
Volvo’s self-driving cars are thrown off by kangaroos
http://www.autoblog.com/2017/07/02/volvo-self-driving-cars-kangaroo/

Volvo, like seemingly every other company, has been working on its autonomous vehicle technology and has run into an interesting problem. While testing its cars in Australia, the company found that kangaroos were both a nuisance and very confusing to its cars.

The vehicles' detection system has been exposed to large animals before – it came across moose while being tested in Sweden and it can respond to deer, elk and caribou. But kangaroos move much differently than other animals and their hopping is throwing off the system. "When it's in the air it actually looks like it's further away, then it lands and it looks closer," Volvo Australia's technical manager David Pickett told the ABC. . . .
This suggests that Pronghorn Antelope and sometimes deer could be an software issue in the U.S., although I have no idea if they bound on hard pavement. Video of Pronghorn bounding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1DvZbblGIk
 
Free story from WSJ:

Norway Takes Lead in Race to Build Autonomous Cargo Ships

The Yara Birkeland, slated for launch late in 2018, will make short trips delivering fertilizer

OSLO—Two Norwegian companies are taking the lead in the race to build the world’s first crewless, autonomously operated ship, an advance that could mark a turning point in seaborne trade.

Dubbed by shipping executives the “Tesla of the Seas,” the Yara Birkeland now under development is scheduled in late 2018 to start sailing fertilizer 37 miles down a fiord from a production facility to the port of Larvik. Using the Global Positioning System, radar, cameras and sensors, the electric ship is designed to navigate itself around other boat traffic and to dock on its own...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/norway-takes-lead-in-race-to-build-autonomous-cargo-ships-1500721202
 
Via GCC:
Team from autonomous EV startup NIO wins car hacking contest at DEF CON 25
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2017/08/20170801-nio.html

The NIO US team took First Place at the DEF CON 25 2017 Car Hacking Village, beating out 10 other teams in the third annual “Capture The Flag” (CTF) security event. Based in Silicon Valley, NIO US is a start-up developing autonomous electric vehicles. (Earlier post.) DEF CON is one of the oldest continuously running hacker conventions, and also one of the largest. . . .

At CTF, participants work on a wide array of security challenges, covering WiFi, ECUs, over-the-air updates, encryption, infotainment, gateways, and remote hacking of connected vehicles. . . .

In March 2017, NIO US announced its first production autonomous electric vehicles will be available in US in 2020. NIO US received its Autonomous Vehicle Testing Permit by the California DMV and is currently testing on public roads in advance of the release of its Level-4 production vehicle. NIO US is part of NIO Inc., with investors including Tencent, Temasek, Baidu Capital, Sequoia Capital, Lenovo, TPG and other world-renowned investment institutions.
 
Via ABG:
Researchers hack a self-driving car by putting stickers on street signs
https://www.autoblog.com/2017/08/04/self-driving-car-sign-hack-stickers/
Researchers at University of Washington, University of Michigan, Stony Brook University, and UC Berkeley have figured out how to hack self-driving cars by putting stickers on street signs. Starting by analyzing the algorithm the vision system uses to classify images, they used a number of different attacks to manipulate signs in order to trick machine learning models into misreading them. For instance, they printed up stickers to trick the vision system an autonomous car would use into reading a stop sign as a 45-mile-per-hour sign, the consequences of which would obviously be very bad in the real world.

In the paper, "Robust Physical-World Attacks on Machine Learning Models," the authors demonstrated four different ways they were able to disrupt the way machines read and classify these signs using only a color printer and a camera. The most troubling part about these experiments is that they all appear very subtle to the human eye, camouflaged as graffiti, art, or incorporated into the sign's imagery.

The first method involves printing up a full-size poster to cover the sign, which looks normal but maybe a little faded in places to a human. This caused the machine vision, from a number of angles and distances, to classify a stop sign as a speed limit sign 100 percent of the time in tests. Stickers placed on a stop sign to look like graffiti spelling the words "love" and "hate" caused the stop sign to read as a speed limit sign two-thirds of the time (and once as a yield sign). An "abstract art" attack – just a few small, strategically placed stickers – had the same effect as the poster cover-up. On a right turn sign, the researchers masked the arrow with grey stickers, and got it to read as a stop sign two-thirds of the time, and an added lane sign the rest of the time. . . .

After figuring out how to confuse the system, though, they only need a photo of the target sign, a color printer, some sticky paper, and the will to live with the consequences of causing someone to blow through a stop sign at 45 miles per hour. . . .
 
Via GCC:
UK issues new guidance on automotive cybersecurity
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2017/08/20170807-ukcyber.html

. . . The 8 main principles are:

  • Organizational security is owned, governed and promoted at board level;

    Security risks are assessed and managed appropriately and proportionately, including those specific to the supply chain;

    Organizations need product aftercare and incident response to ensure systems are secure over their lifetime;

    All organizations, including sub-contractors, suppliers and potential 3rd parties, work together to enhance the security of the system;

    Systems are designed using a defense-in-depth approach;

    The security of all software is managed throughout its lifetime;

    The storage and transmission of data is secure and can be controlled;

    The system is designed to be resilient to attacks and respond appropriately when its defenses or sensors fail. . . .
 
On the same issue, via IEVS:
Fleet-Wide Autopilot Hack Is Tesla’s Biggest Security Concern
http://insideevs.com/fleet-wide-autopilot-hack-tesla-biggest-security-concern/

. . . Musk was the keynote speaker at the recent National Governors Association 2017 Summer Meeting. As we reported, he provided a wealth of information and it’s all available on video. However, Musk stated that Tesla’s biggest concern is a fleet-wide Autopilot hack. He said:

  • “I think one of the biggest concern for autonomous vehicles is somebody achieving a fleet-wide hack.”

    “In principle, if someone was able to hack all the autonomous Teslas, they could say … I mean just as a prank … they could send them all to Rhode Island … across the United States … and that would be the end of Tesla and there would be a lot of angry people in Rhode Island. . . .”

Musk made it clear that Tesla is doing everything that it can to assure that something like this can’t happen. He continued:

  • “We gotta make super sure that a fleet-wide is basically impossible and that if people are in the car, that they have override authority on whatever the car is doing. If the car is doing something wacky, you can press a button that no amount of software can override and ensure that you gain control of the vehicle and cut the link to the servers.”

He also assured that there are many system and sub-systems already in place within each Tesla vehicle. High-level encryption makes it so that an outside hacker can’t control powertrain or braking. . . .
 
Via IEVS (the headline's misleading, as the issues apply to all AVs):
Will Tesla Self-Driving Cars Affect Traffic Law Enforcement
http://insideevs.com/tesla-self-driving-cars-traffic-law-enforcement/

How will the advent of self-driving cars affect traffic law enforcement? Florida law firm Denmon & Pearlman has considered the question carefully, and created this infographic to illustrate some of the issues involved.

It’s widely expected that autonomous vehicles will make our roads safer. According to Denmon & Pearlman (a list of sources is provided at the bottom of the infographic), 94% of crashes are caused by human error. Widespread adoption of self-driving cars could reduce both the number of accidents and the rate of fatalities. That means fewer police officers and EMTs working accident scenes, a duty that we’re sure they would be happy to avoid.

Self-driving cars could also mean fewer traffic stops – according to Denmon & Pearlman’s sources, around 800,000 drivers get pulled over every day, and vehicle autonomy could eliminate some 56% of these stops. That would surely be a good thing for all concerned. For law officers, traffic stops are time-consuming and stressful. For drivers, they are embarrassing and potentially expensive. In rare but well-publicized cases, they result in tragedy.

Depending on how you look at it, however, the news isn’t all good. Less need for traffic enforcement will mean fewer jobs for police officers, and fewer traffic tickets will mean less revenue for local governments. D & P estimate that speeding tickets alone represent $6 billion in fines every year. If 1 out of 4 cars is self-driving by 2030, that revenue could shrink by 25%. Will law-abiding citizens have to pay more in taxes to make up the shortfall? . . .
All these issues and more are discussed in "Driverless: Intelligent Cars and the Road Ahead", but there are some good graphics in this article, although they mistakenly left two categories of traffic stop in the 'avoidable' category which would reduce the number of stops by another 2.36%, as neither should apply for fully autonomous vehicles: suspended license and window tint. It may well be that a further 16.05%, for 'registration' would disappear, depending on how much information/control over AVs DMVs have. One scenario would be that a car which isn't registered would be rendered inoperable.

IIRR, "Driverless" mentions that NYC collects $600 million a year in parking fines alone, so the money from this and other fines would have to be found elsewhere once these sorts of violations no longer occur. On the positive side, there'd be less need for parking garages and lots (one of the least lucrative sources of property taxes, allowing the real estate to be used for other uses) and roads could be narrowed, decreasing road construction and maintenance costs; traffic signals would also decrease and maybe go away completely at some future point, etc.
 
Via ABG:
Arlington, TX gets autonomous shuttles for Cowboys, Rangers games
https://www.autoblog.com/2017/08/15/arlington-tx-gets-autonomous-shuttles-for-cowboys-rangers-game/

As numerous authorities on AVs have pointed out, the first places they'll appear will likely be in areas restricted to other traffic, corporate campuses and the like, and slow speeds. This is an example.
 
GRA said:
Via ABG:
Arlington, TX gets autonomous shuttles for Cowboys, Rangers games
https://www.autoblog.com/2017/08/15/arlington-tx-gets-autonomous-shuttles-for-cowboys-rangers-game/

As numerous authorities on AVs have pointed out, the first places they'll appear will likely be in areas restricted to other traffic, corporate campuses and the like, and slow speeds. This is an example.
Not to mention the fact that buses like the EZ10 eliminate a driver, which means they will save money in the long run.
 
RegGuheert said:
GRA said:
Via ABG:
Arlington, TX gets autonomous shuttles for Cowboys, Rangers games
https://www.autoblog.com/2017/08/15/arlington-tx-gets-autonomous-shuttles-for-cowboys-rangers-game/

As numerous authorities on AVs have pointed out, the first places they'll appear will likely be in areas restricted to other traffic, corporate campuses and the like, and slow speeds. This is an example.
Not to mention the fact that buses like the EZ10 eliminate a driver, which means they will save money in the long run.
As will all commercial AVs, i.e. taxis/limos/buses/over the road trucks. AVs are already in use as big dump trucks in mines/quarries, and there's also AV ag equipment (GPS-guided tractors etc.) using autosteer in service, although at the moment they still have a human in the cab: http://www.agriculture.com/content/fully-autonomous-vehicles-are-coming

Local P&D trucks will probably retain a human crew, just to handle and move the load to/from truck to door/warehouse. Small courier AVs that can deliver direct to door, handle steps and elevators etc. may not need that.
 
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