[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 128 (Tuesday, July 3, 2012)]
[Notices]
[Pages 39561-39564]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-16250]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

[Docket No. NHTSA-2012-0057]


Advanced Braking Technologies That Rely on Forward-Looking 
Sensors; Request for Comments

AGENCY: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), 
Department of Transportation.

ACTION: Notice; Request for comments on research report.

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SUMMARY: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) 
has, for about two years, been studying advanced braking technologies 
that rely on forward-looking sensors to supplement driver braking or to 
actuate automatic braking in response to an impending crash. NHTSA 
believes these technologies show promise for enhancing vehicle safety 
by helping drivers to avoid crashes or mitigate the severity and 
effects of crashes. NHTSA is soliciting comments on the results of its 
research thus far to help guide its continued efforts in this area.

DATES: Comments: The agency must receive comments on or before 
September 4, 2012.

ADDRESSES: Comments should refer to the docket number above and be 
submitted by one of the following methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. 
Follow the online instructions for submitting comments. Fax: 1-202-493-
2251.
     Mail: Docket Management Facility, U.S. Department of 
Transportation, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE., West Building Ground Floor, 
Room W12-140, Washington, DC 20590-0001.
     Hand Delivery: West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 
1200 New Jersey Avenue SE., Washington, DC, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. 
ET, Monday through Friday, except Federal Holidays.
    Instructions: For detailed instructions on submitting comments and 
additional information on the rulemaking process, see the Public 
Participation heading of the Supplementary Information section of this 
document. Note that all comments received will be posted without change 
to http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information 
provided.
    Privacy Act: Anyone is able to search the electronic form of all 
comments received into any of our dockets by the

[[Page 39562]]

name of the individual submitting the comment (or signing the comment, 
if submitted on behalf of an association, business, labor union, etc.). 
You may review DOT's complete Privacy Act Statement in the Federal 
Register published on April 11, 2000 (Volume 65, Number 70; Pages 
19477-78).
    Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to http://www.regulations.gov or the street 
address listed above. Follow the online instructions for accessing the 
dockets.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms. Abigail Morgan of NHTSA's Office 
of Crash Avoidance Standards at (202) 366-6005 or by email at 
[email protected]. For technical issues, contact Mr. Garrick 
Forkenbrock of NHTSA's Vehicle Research and Test Center (VRTC) at (937) 
666-3317 or by email at [email protected]. Mail to these 
officials may be sent in care of the National Highway Traffic Safety 
Administration, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE., West Building, Washington, 
DC 20590-0001.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Table of Contents

I. Background
II. Areas in Which the Agency Seeks Comment
    A. Test Protocols
    B. Surrogate Vehicle and Related Testing Equipment
    C. System Functionality and Performance
    D. Target Population and Its Relationship to Benefit Estimates
    E. Activities of Other Countries, Multiple Government Entities, 
or Non-Government Organizations (NGOs)
III. Public Participation

I. Background

    There are presently three forward-looking technologies intended to 
address rear-end crashes involving light vehicles in the United States: 
Forward Collision Warning (FCW), Dynamic Brake Support (DBS), and Crash 
Imminent Braking (CIB). These technologies, listed in the order of 
increasing vehicle system assistance/intervention, may be generally 
defined as follows:
    Forward Collision Warning (FCW): A system that uses information 
from forward-looking sensors, usually a camera or radar, to determine 
whether or not a crash is likely or unavoidable and that, in such 
cases, warns the driver so the driver can brake and/or steer to avoid 
or minimize the impact of the crash.
    Dynamic Brake Support (DBS): A system that uses information from 
forward-looking sensors about driving situations in which a crash is 
likely or unavoidable to supplement automatically the output of the 
brakes when the DBS system senses that the force being applied by the 
driver to the brake pedal is insufficient to avoid the crash.
    Crash Imminent Braking (CIB): A system that uses information from 
forward-looking sensors to automatically apply the brakes in driving 
situations in which a crash is likely or unavoidable and the driver 
makes no attempt to avoid the crash.
    In 2010, NHTSA began a thorough examination of the state of 
forward-looking advanced braking technologies, analyzing their 
performance and identifying areas of concern or uncertainty, in an 
effort to better understand their potential. The agency's recent 
research and analysis of DBS and CIB systems have been documented in 
the report ``Forward-Looking Advanced Braking Technologies: An analysis 
of current system performance, effectiveness, and test protocols'' 
(2012). This report is referred to below as the ``2012 report.'' The 
report is available in the Forward Looking Advanced Braking 
Technologies docket NHTSA-2012-0057 at www.regulations.gov.
    Our efforts to date indicate that DBS and CIB have the capability 
to provide substantial safety benefits (to varying degrees, depending 
on which vehicle make and model is considered). However, we continue to 
explore test procedures and effectiveness of these systems and to 
refine the performance criteria that should be used to assess these 
systems.
    NHTSA will use information from the public to guide its continued 
efforts regarding DBS and CIB technologies.

II. Opportunity for the Public To Comment

    The efforts of the agency described in the 2012 report have 
significantly enhanced NHTSA's knowledge of forward-looking advanced 
braking technologies and the state of their development. The agency 
wants to enhance its knowledge further and to help guide its continued 
efforts. This includes work regarding effectiveness, test operation 
(including how to ensure repeatability using a target or surrogate 
vehicle), refinement of performance criteria, and exploring the need 
for an approach and criteria for ``false positive'' tests to minimize 
unintended negative consequences. To that end, the agency is seeking 
public comment in the specific areas listed below. Any other relevant 
comments are welcome and encouraged. However, the subjects below are 
the areas in which the agency thinks comments will most advance the 
agency's knowledge. The agency also recognizes that, for some questions 
below, the information provided by commenters will be manufacturer-
specific and may be considered confidential. Comments containing 
confidential information should be submitted consistent with section 
III. Public Participation.

A. Test Protocols

    The draft test protocols for CIB and DBS prepared by the agency use 
speed reductions and crash avoidance measures for assessing system 
effectiveness (see Docket NHTSA-2012-0057). The agency has the 
following questions in this area:
(1) Performance
    (a) Can the tests be performed within the tolerances (i.e., 
subject-vehicle and principle-other-vehicle test speeds, lateral 
movement, yaw rates, etc.) provided in the Phase 2 (October 2011) 
version of the agency's CIB and DBS test protocols, which are located 
in the docket?
    (b) Are there sections of the test protocols that require 
additional detail or more clearly-defined instructions?
    (c) Do the specified speed reductions in the draft performance 
measures accurately test system effectiveness?
    (d) Are the speed reduction criteria under consideration feasible 
for CIB and DBS systems? If not, what system changes would be 
necessary?
    (e) Given the idealized test conditions, is it feasible to achieve 
the speed reductions under consideration during each test trial?
    (f) Can fault codes occur during testing when the test vehicle 
makes contact with the surrogate vehicle? Will fault codes that occur 
during testing have an impact on system performance?
    (g) False positive tests are not presently included in the CIB or 
DBS test protocols. Work performed at the agency's VRTC has indicated 
it is possible to observe consistent false positive CIB activations; 
however, these false positive CIB activations were found to be vehicle-
dependent and occurred during only one of seven test scenarios: driving 
over a 1-inch thick steel plate lying flat on the pavement (a plate 
often used as a temporary cover during road repairs). Will the omission 
of a false positive test (or suite of such tests) have the potential to 
promote systems prone to such behavior? Are CIB and DBS false 
activations expected to have an adverse effect on safety, or a concern 
of customer acceptance of the technologies?

[[Page 39563]]

(2) DBS Test Protocol
    (a) In the DBS test protocol, is the manner in which the brake 
controller is used (i.e., whether its control logic is based on pedal 
position or brake application force) a short-term concern expected to 
affect only a limited population of vehicles, or will this protocol 
have more serious implications on future-generation vehicles (e.g., 
vehicles with throttle-by-wire braking)?
    (b) For DBS testing, is the methodology used for ``Foundation Brake 
System Characterization'' a reasonable approach for objectively 
evaluating a vehicle's brake system without advanced braking 
technologies such as DBS or brake assist? Please explain if the DBS 
test approach will activate brake assist technologies in some vehicles 
and not in others? Should this issue be further evaluated while 
attempting to derive the benefits of DBS?
    (c) Does the DBS test protocol provision for a vehicle to be 
evaluated with one of two force-based applications, pedal position or 
brake application, provide enough flexibility to evaluate the 
performance of systems appropriately?
    (d) Will the DBS system performance observed in tests performed in 
accordance with the DBS test protocol be sufficiently representative of 
the performance expected in the ``real-world,'' given similar input 
conditions (including driver-based brake applications or similar 
magnitudes and rates)? Would such testing be sufficient to ensure 
robust performance, i.e., good performance in a broad range of 
conditions?

B. Surrogate Vehicle and Related Testing Equipment

    The agency recognizes surrogate vehicles (strikeable artificial 
vehicles or target vehicles) are necessary to safely perform CIB and 
DBS tests. NHTSA believes an acceptable surrogate vehicle should be 
``realistic'' (i.e., be interpreted the same as an actual vehicle) to 
systems using RADAR, camera, LIDAR, and/or infrared sensors to assess 
the potential threat of a rear-end collision. The surrogate vehicle 
should be robust and able to withstand repeated impacts from the CIB- 
or DBS-equipped test vehicle with little to no hysteresis over time. A 
test vehicle should not incur damage resulting from repeated impacts 
with the surrogate vehicle. Construction of the surrogate vehicle 
should be consistent.
    (1) Please provide specific recommendations for other surrogate 
vehicle design considerations that should be addressed (physical 
characteristics, radar reflectivity, material type, etc.) and 
suggestions for how those attributes could be objectively validated.
    (2) To ensure real-world robustness, should NHTSA use a ``fleet'' 
of different surrogate vehicles? Is there a need to conduct testing 
with a fleet of different surrogate vehicles representing various 
vehicle body styles that any system would encounter in the real world 
to ensure robustness? If there is such a need, describe what body 
styles should comprise the fleet.
    (3) Testing conducted on behalf of the agency used a simple 
platform on which the surrogate vehicle was mounted and towed. This 
apparatus worked well with good repeatability and reasonable cost, but 
it was unable to accurately accommodate the decelerating lead vehicle 
test condition. In future testing, NHTSA intends to use a rigid 
mechanical link between the surrogate vehicle and the towing vehicle to 
enable the testing of the decelerating lead vehicle condition. The 
agency welcomes specific recommendations for a practical, feasible, 
standardized towing system.

C. System Functionality and Performance

    (1) Operational Speed: Once a system has been initialized, in what 
speed range does it remain fully functional? What speed reduction 
levels are achievable with systems presently available or soon-to-be 
available (5-10 years)? Under what crash scenarios are those speed 
reductions achievable (i.e., speeds of vehicles involved and distance 
between vehicles)? What changes to current systems would improve system 
performance (sensor quality or quantity, better algorithms, etc.)?
    (2) Suppression algorithms: The agency requests comments on the 
rationale used to determine when a CIB and/or DBS system will be 
activated and when its activation will be suppressed including, but not 
limited to answers to the following questions:
    (a) What inputs to the steering wheel and/or throttle pedal are 
capable of suppressing system activation?
    (b) If an object is on the roadway in the driver's forward path, 
what characteristics of the object or situation will cause the system 
activation to be suppressed?
    (c) How and why could the presence of one or more unbelted vehicle 
occupants suppress or limit system operation?
    (d) If the system activation is suppressed because of an unbelted 
occupant, on which unbelted occupants does the system suppression rely 
(e.g., driver, front seat passenger, rear seat passenger)?
    (e) If suppression is based on vehicle speed, what are the relative 
and absolute upper and lower velocity thresholds? What is the rationale 
for these limits?
    (f) Are certain environmental conditions capable of suppressing 
system activation (e.g., a wet/rainy roadway surface)? If so, please 
describe these conditions and explain how these conditions are measured 
and determined by the vehicle?
    (g) What other factors can be capable of suppressing, or 
contributing to the suppression, of system activation?
    (3) System Robustness: What environmental and/or driving conditions 
totally or partially negate the ability of CIB and/or DBS systems 
presently on the market to perform as designed (e.g., driving in the 
dark or in adverse weather)? What information should be communicated to 
the driver when conditions have negated the system's capabilities and 
how? Are there improvements under development to respond to these 
challenges? What are they and what is the timing of their availability? 
What is the expected useful life of the system components installed in 
vehicles presently on the market?

D. Target Population and Its Relationship to Benefit Estimates

    (1) With the relatively short time to collision (TTC) defining when 
a CIB and/or DBS operation is possible (i.e., system availability), 
what is the effectiveness of these systems, if activated, at preventing 
a fatal crash when the relative front-to-rear end impact speed 
(difference in speed between the two vehicles involved in crash) is 80 
km/h or higher?
    (2) In fatal crashes in which the lead vehicle was a large truck or 
trailer, under what circumstances would the CIB and/or DBS technology 
have decreased the impact speed enough to prevent the fatality given 
the current state of the technology?
    (3) At what impact speed is it reasonable to assume that the 
outcomes of high speed fatal crashes in which the fatalities occurred 
in the lead (struck) vehicle would be the same if CIB and/or DBS 
systems were activated, due to the fact that the impact was severe and 
the crashworthiness of the vehicle was exceeded?

[[Page 39564]]

E. Activities of Other Countries, Multiple Government Entities, or Non-
Government Organizations (NGOs)

    In addition to the studies listed in the Review of Literature and 
Current Activities section of the 2012 report, are there additional 
noteworthy activities that are planned or ongoing by individual 
countries, entities consisting of multiple governments, or non-
government organizations (NGOs) that may provide additional information 
on the capabilities, limitations, and readiness of these systems?

III. Public Participation

How do I prepare and submit comments?

    Your comments must be written and in English. To ensure that your 
comments are correctly filed in the Docket, please include the docket 
number of this document in your comments.
    Comments may be submitted to the docket electronically by logging 
onto the Docket Management System Web site at http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the online instructions for submitting 
comments.
    You may also submit two copies of your comments, including the 
attachments, to Docket Management at the address given above under 
ADDRESSES.
    Please note that pursuant to the Data Quality Act, in order for 
substantive data to be relied upon and used by the agency, it must meet 
the information quality standards set forth in the Office of Management 
and Budget (OMB) and DOT Data Quality Act guidelines. Accordingly, we 
encourage you to consult the guidelines in preparing your comments. 
OMB's guidelines may be accessed at http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/fedreg/reproducible.html. DOT's guidelines may be accessed at http://dms.dot.gov.

How can I be sure that my comments were received?

    If you wish Docket Management to notify you upon its receipt of 
your comments, enclose a self-addressed, stamped postcard in the 
envelope containing your comments. Upon receiving your comments, Docket 
Management will return the postcard by mail.

How do I submit confidential business information?

    If you wish to submit any information under a claim of 
confidentiality, you should submit three copies of your complete 
submission, including the information you claim to be confidential 
business information, to the Chief Counsel, NHTSA, at the address given 
above under FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT. In addition, you should 
submit two copies, from which you have deleted the claimed confidential 
business information, to Docket Management at the address given above 
under ADDRESSES. When you send a comment containing information claimed 
to be confidential business information, you should include a cover 
letter setting forth the information specified in our confidential 
business information regulation. (See 49 CFR part 512.)

How can I read the comments submitted by other people?

    You may read the comments received by Docket Management at the 
address given above under ADDRESSES. The hours of the Docket are 
indicated above in the same location. You may also see the comments on 
the Internet. To read the comments on the Internet, go to http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the online instructions for accessing the 
dockets.
    Please note that even after the comment closing date, we will 
continue to file relevant information in the Docket as it becomes 
available. Further, some people may submit late comments. Accordingly, 
we recommend that you periodically check the Docket for new material.

    Authority: 49 U.S.C. 30101.

    Issued: June 26, 2012.
Nathaniel Beuse,
Director, Office of Crash Avoidance Standards.
[FR Doc. 2012-16250 Filed 7-2-12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-59-P