Driverless Cars

What do driverless cars use sensors for?

• Ordering fast food when the car thinks you're hungry

• Spatial awareness, location and route guidance

• To guess which tv programmes you want to watch when you arrive

• Which playlist to play through the car's stereo

Data from Renault, Nissan Motor Company and Mitsubishi Motors indicates that ​ (a)   of businesses expect their fleets to be autonomous within ​ (b)   ! 

• 55%
• two decades
• 45%
• 10%
• 100%
• 10 years
• 50 years
• 100 years
• three decades
• a decade

There are currently ​ (a)   levels of driving automation, as defined by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). 

• six
• five
• four
• ten

Match the following

• Several technologies, in isolation, may assist the driver

• Level 0

• Cars can control at least two automated functions simultaneously

• Level 2

• In this level, the human driver controls all car operations in this vehicle.

• Level 1

Match the following

• These cars are fully-autonomous in some driving scenarios

• Level 3

• The car can control all safety-critical functions whilst the driver is alerted

• Level 5

• In all situations, these cars will drive themselves without requiring any driver intervention

• Level 4

You've read 3 advantages and 3 disadvantages of driverless cars. Type one more advantage and one more disadvantage below. This can be from your own research or your own experience.

Answer explanation

ADVANTAGES

-A considerable benefit is that autonomous cars do not require rest stops, making journeys shorter and more efficient.

-Machines also make much fewer mistakes than human drivers; just over 1% of crash data was at the fault of the autonomous system.

-Commuting will be cleaner, with up to 7% reduction in fuel consumption by allowing the car to use it’s autonomous driving features (namely the adaptive cruise control features which is available in many vehicles already).

DISADVANTAGES

-Autonomous cars are currently expensive to buy and run.

-There’s also the issue of hacking; the car could be breached and lose control in the middle of a journey.

-Also, the weather could affect the autonomous technology, with Tesla stating that their Autopilot may experience errors due to poor visibility, poor weather conditions, and extreme temperatures.

After reading about driverless cars, let us know how you feel about their use on the roads. Are you for them or against them. Record a 30 second response, making sure to reference at least 1 point from the article.