Skip to main content

NHTSA to add automatic braking systems vehicle safety features

US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has announced that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration plans to add two cutting-edge automatic emergency braking systems to the recommended advanced safety features included under its New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) – the latest step in a half-century of safety innovations that have saved more than 600,000 lives, according to new NHTSA research. The agency plans to continue to encourage development and commercialization of additional promising saf
January 23, 2015 Read time: 3 mins
US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has announced that the 834 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration plans to add two cutting-edge automatic emergency braking systems to the recommended advanced safety features included under its New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) – the latest step in a half-century of safety innovations that have saved more than 600,000 lives, according to new NHTSA research.

The agency plans to continue to encourage development and commercialization of additional promising safety-related technologies of vehicle automation through its recommendation of two automatic emergency braking systems – crash imminent braking (CIB) and dynamic brake support (DBS). The addition is the latest in a long history of safety innovations covered in NHTSA's new report, which uses data from the agency's Fatal Accident Reporting System to create a statistical model that estimated safety technologies have saved 613,501 lives since 1960.

According to NHTSA data, one-third of all police-reported crashes in 2013 involved a rear-end collision with another vehicle at the start of the crash. The agency also found that a large number of drivers involved in rear-end crashes either did not apply the brakes at all or did not apply the brakes fully prior to the crash. Crash imminent braking and dynamic brake support systems can intervene by automatically applying the vehicle's brakes or supplementing the driver's braking effort to mitigate the severity of the crash or to avoid it altogether.

These AEB systems, along with promising innovations such as vehicle-to-vehicle communications (V2V) and automated vehicle technologies hold great promise to save even more lives and prevent even more crashes, building upon the successes of crashworthiness and crash avoidance technologies currently available in vehicles today. As these technologies mature, NHSTA will continue to accelerate its push on innovative and effective solutions to reduce the staggering toll of motor vehicle crashes in the U.S. through our research, regulatory, and consumer information programs.

The NHTSA action also marks the first step in a broader revision of NCAP and seeks to ensure the program continues to encourage both consumers and automakers to develop and adopt advanced vehicle safety technologies.

"Adding AEB to our list of recommended features will encourage consumers to consider AEB as a factor in their new car purchase and encourage automakers to make this important innovation more widely available," said NHTSA Administrator Mark Rosekind. "NCAP is a critical tool for enhancing safety, so we are also looking at additional innovations to the program to capitalise on this exciting period of progress in safety technology."

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Hikvision maximises safety with smart video technology
    September 12, 2022
    Around the world, thousands of people are injured or killed in road traffic accidents every day. To maximise safety for motorists and other road users, cities and highways authorities are implementing smart video solutions that alert emergency teams when an accident occurs in real time – supporting faster responses and potentially saving lives, says Juan Sádaba, ITS business development manager at Hikvision Spain
  • Goodyear innovation could make tyre pumps obsolete
    April 16, 2012
    Goodyear has announced it is developing Air Maintenance Technology (AMT) that will enable tyres to remain inflated at the optimum pressure without the need for any external pumps or electronics. All components of the AMT system, including the miniaturised pump, will be fully contained within the tyre.
  • Safer roads need safe systems approach, better infrastructure
    January 19, 2012
    Some developed countries are far from leading the way when it comes to making road infrastructure safe. In fact, says the Road Safety Foundation's Joanne Hill, they learn a lot from what is happening in emergent nations. A new report from the Road Safety Foundation, 'Saving Lives, Saving Money - the costs and benefits of achieving safe roads', makes some startling assertions about attitudes to road safety. Although concerned predominantly with the UK, there are some universal lessons to be learned, accordin
  • V2V capabilities to feature in over half of cars sold by 2022, say researchers
    May 19, 2017
    A new report from Juniper Research has revealed that, by 2022, 50 per cent of new vehicles will be shipped with vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) hardware, a technology that enables real-time short-range communication between vehicles. The new research, Consumer Connected Cars: Applications, Telematics & V2V 2017-2022, found that the total number of V2V-enabled consumer vehicles on the road will reach 35 million by 2022, up from less than 150,000 vehicles in 2017. This strong growth rate (376 per cent CAGR) reflects