As electric vehicle sales surge, discussions are now turning to noise and safety

Published

4 years ago

June 7, 2021

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Martin Pickard | Moment | Getty Images

Hyperloop, hydrogen-powered trains, and air-taxis. As the 21^st century progresses, the way people get from A to B is on the cusp of a significant shift driven by design and innovation.

While the above technologies may be a few years off from widespread adoption, that’s not to say change isn’t already afoot.

Around the world, national and municipal governments are attempting to slash emissions and boost urban air quality, with many putting their faith in a growing sector: battery electric vehicles.

There’s undoubtedly momentum behind the industry. A recent report from the International Energy Agency stated roughly 3 million new electric cars were registered last year, a record amount and a 41% rise compared to 2019.

Looking ahead, the IEA says the number of electric cars, buses, vans and heavy trucks on roads — its projection does not include two- and three-wheeled electric vehicles — is expected to hit 145 million by 2030.

If governments ramp up efforts to meet international energy and climate goals, the global fleet could increase further still, expanding to 230 million by the end of the decade.

A changing world

As the number of electric vehicles on the planet’s roads increases, society will need to adapt.

Extensive charging networks, for example, will need to be rolled out to meet increased demand and dispel lingering concerns around “range anxiety” — the idea that electric vehicles aren’t able to undertake long journeys without losing power and getting stranded.

Another area where we will notice change relates to noise: As well as boasting zero tailpipe emissions, electric vehicles are far quieter than their diesel and gasoline cousins.

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This means less noise pollution in urban areas — clearly a good thing — but also throws up a potential challenge for other road users, especially those with sight problems.

“For people who are blind or partially sighted, judging traffic can be really difficult,” Zoe Courtney-Bodgener, policy and campaigns officer at the U.K.-based Royal National Institute of Blind People, told CNBC in a phone interview.

Courtney-Bodgener explained that an increasing number of “quiet” modes of transport were now being used, giving the example of bicycles and larger electric and hybrid vehicles.

“If you can’t always or reliably use vision to detect those vehicles, then sound is even more important,” she went on to state.

“And when the sound is not there, or is not loud enough to be able to reliably detect those vehicles, obviously that presents danger because … you’re not reliably able to know when a vehicle is approaching you.”

The law of the land

It should be noted that, around the world, legislation and technology have already been introduced in a bid tackle this issue.

In the European Union and U.K., for example, all new electric and hybrid vehicles will have to use an acoustic vehicle alerting system, or AVAS, from July 1. This will build upon and broaden previous regulations which came into force in 2019.

Under the rules, the AVAS is supposed to kick in and make noise when a vehicle’s speed is under 20 kilometers per hour (around 12 miles per hour) and when it’s in reverse.

According to a statement from the U.K. government in 2019, the sound “can be temporarily deactivated by the driver if judged necessary.”

The EU’s regulation says the noise made by the AVAS “shall be a continuous sound that provides information to the pedestrians and other road users of a vehicle in operation.”

“The sound should be easily indicative of vehicle behaviour,” it adds, “and should sound similar to the sound of a vehicle of the same category equipped with an internal combustion engine.”

The RNIB’s Courtney-Bodgener told CNBC that while her organization was “happy” the AVAS directive had been translated into U.K. law, it did not “do all of the things that we want it to do.”

She went on to explain how the speed at which the AVAS cuts in perhaps needed to be increased to 20 or 30 miles per hour.

“We’re not convinced that if … a vehicle is travelling at, say 13 miles per hour, it would generate, on its own, enough noise for it to be reliably detectable by sound.”

Another area of concern relates to older vehicles. “There are already lots and lots of electric and hybrid vehicles that were produced before this legislation came into force and do not have the sound technology on them,” she said.

There was currently no provision to retrofit these, she added. “That is a concern because there are already thousands of vehicles on roads around the U.K. that do not have the AVAS technology.”

From the industry’s point of view, it seems to be content with the regulations already in place. In a statement sent to CNBC via email, AVERE, The European Association for Electromobility, told CNBC it supported the “current legislative status quo.”

“The limit of 20 km/h is sufficient, since at this level other noises — notably rolling tyre resistance — take over and are sufficient for pedestrians and cyclists to hear EVs and hybrids approaching,” the Brussels-based organization added.

“In fact, mandating additional noise beyond 20 km/h would rob European citizens of one of the primary benefits of electrification: reduced noise levels at city speeds.”

Noise pollution can indeed be a serious issue. According to the European Environment Agency, over 100 million people in Europe “are exposed to harmful levels of environmental noise pollution.” The agency singles out road traffic noise as being “a particular public health problem across many urban areas.”

On the subject of older cars needing to be updated, AVERE said: “Only a very small share of EVs on European roads would be subject to retrofitting requirements, given the fact that many existing vehicles have already been fitted with AVAS in anticipation of the new requirements, and that the rules have been put in place in time to support the expected mass uptake of EVs in coming years.”

If “additional requirements” were found to be necessary, AVERE said it stood ready to engage with policymakers.

The future

Discussions and debate surrounding this topic look set to continue for a good while yet and it’s clear that a balance will need to be struck going forward.

Regardless of whether one thinks the current legislation goes far enough or not, the fact remains these types of systems are set to become an increasingly important feature of urban transport in the years ahead.

Robert Fisher is head of EV technologies at research and consultancy firm SBD Automotive.

He told CNBC via email that testing conducted by the company had “found AVAS to be quite effective” but went on to add that if a pedestrian wasn’t familiar with the noise, “they may not automatically associate it with the presence of an approaching vehicle.”

“Currently, AVAS is mostly hindered by inconsistent legislation and a lack of innovation,” he said, before going on to strike a positive tone regarding the future.

“As we move away from the internal combustion engine, this technology has the potential to become a key part of a car’s character, a point of brand differentiation, and has the ability to save lives.”

Environment

The oddly personal truth about ADAS: self-driving cars are like running shoes

Published

7 hours ago

August 8, 2025

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The oddly personal truth about ADAS: self-driving cars are like running shoes

There you are, motoring along in your Volvo XC90 PHEV with the Pilot Assist engaged alongside a big 18-wheeler at a comfortable 70 mph cruise when the interstate starts to slowly sweep left. From the drivers’ seat, that semi on your right looks awfully close. As the steering wheel turns itself in your hand, you start to wonder if that truck’s a bit too close. The car isn’t doing anything wrong, but it’s too close for your comfort and you give the wheel a little nudge to hug the inside of the lane just a bit more.

These deeply personal preferences are tough to quantify, and highlight a simple fact about Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) that the industry at-large hasn’t yet to come to terms with: when it comes to self-driving cars, one size does not fit all.

The Volvo experience I outlined above was very real, happening just as the wife and I were arguing about the relative merits of our very different choice in running shoes. She prefers the supportive, cushion-y ride of the HOKA Clifton 9s, which I’ve become convinced are The Devil™, preferring instead the zero-lift, no-cushion feel of my Xero Prio runners. The intervention with the Volvo interrupted that particular argument and started another. Namely, the one about why I had chosen that moment to “interfere” with the Pilot Assist.

“It was too close to that truck,” I explained. “Freaked me out.”

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“That’s how I feel in the Honda,” she said. “I’m always afraid that it’s going to try and put me into oncoming traffic.”

That’s when the idea for this post came to me. Because, as a car brand, it’s really not possible to just say that your car has ADAS or doesn’t have ADAS in a binary sense. That’s because these systems are not just proprietary to a given brand, they can vary from vehicle-to-vehicle within that brand, and each one can have distinct lane centering behavior, steering feel, lane change aggressiveness, braking distances, timing for its hand-off warnings, and probably a bunch of other stuff that I haven’t even thought of depending on what kind of cameras, sensors, and software the specific vehicle you are in is equipped with.

It’s a bit of a mess, in other words.

Opinion: Honda Sensing gets it right

I first experienced Honda’s ADAS in 2014, driving a then-new CR-V between Chicago and Bay Harbor, Michigan for an Acura press drive. Even in its early generations, I was impressed with the way it handled stop-and-go traffic, the way it guided you through turns, but didn’t do the turning for you, and the speed and intensity it used in braking very much mirrored my own.

Last month, I had a chance to test out the 2025 Honda Civic Sport Touring Hybrid for a week on Cape Cod. I picked the car up at PreFlight Parking outside Boston Logan, jammed it with luggage, and immediately hit heavy traffic, where the Honda Sensing Low-Speed Follow function took me right back to 2014, ratatouille-style, when my experience in that car had led me to believe that self-driving cars were right around the corner.

In the decade-plus since experiencing that first autonomous Acura, I’ve had the chance to experience Ford BlueCruise, Tesla Autopilot and FSD, and Mercedes-Benz DRIVE PILOT. And all, interestingly enough, in and around the Circuit of the Americas in Austin at one time or another over my three years of hosting Electrify Expo events there.

Each different OEMs’ system had its strengths and quirks. I remember Mercedes DRIVE PILOT as impressively precise, even clinical. The Ford system faded into memory. I couldn’t tell you anything about it, which is probably high praise. The Tesla systems, though, stood out — but for all the wrong reasons. Lane changes came too quickly, it accelerated too late, and too aggressively, and I often found myself bracing for collisions that (in fairness) never came.

More than once in those years I’ve wondered if maybe I’d just got it wrong back in 2014. That the tech was so new, and I had been so wow’ed by it initially, that I had got swept up in the hype of self-driving cars … but that drive in my wife’s XC90, back-to-back as it was with the Civic Hybrid, showed me that wasn’t it. Instead, I just didn’t like the way those other cars drove. Just like I don’t like the way HOKAs feel. And, just like my wife isn’t wrong for liking her gross marshmallow shoes (probably), I’m not wrong for preferring a more restrained digital co-pilot.

It’s a matter of fit, not fact — and that’s going to be a tough sell.

Everyone but me is wrong

[embedded content]

Classic Carlin bit.

As the great George Carlin once asked, “Have you ever noticed that anyone who is driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone driving faster than you is a maniac?”

ADAS systems live squarely in that same subjective space occupied by other drivers. If the bots brake too hard, steer too sharply, or get too close to the car head before changing lanes, they might not be technically doing anything wrong, but they’re maniacs – and right now, there’s no real way to know how one car’s ADAS is going to behave until you’ve spent some significant time behind the wheel. Like, “Uh-oh. I bought a thing and I hate it,” amounts of time.

That’s a problem for both buyers and sellers (to say nothing of manufacturers and software developers), because why would you risk demonstrating a system that might scare someone? How do you sell “confidence” and “convenience” when what feels confident and convenient to one driver feels reckless to another, and milquetoast to a third?

Lucky for you guys, I have a solution.

Jojo’s ADAS scorecard *

System	Lane centering bias	Lane change distance (car lengths)	Follow distance (default)	Braking force (max Gs)	Hands-off time allowed	Overall “feel”
Ford BlueCruise	Centered	~3.5	Moderate	0.30 G	Medium	Stable
Honda Sensing	Slight left bias	~2.5	Safe	0.35 G	Short	Balanced
Mercedes-Benz DRIVE PILOT	Centered	~3.5	Moderate	0.40 G	Long	Confident
Tesla Autopilot	Centered	~1.5	Close	0.45 G	Long (varies)	Aggressive
Volvo Pilot Assist	Slight right bias	~3.0	Moderate	0.30 G	Moderate	Cautious

NOTE: THESE ARE NOT REAL VALUES

That asterisk (*) is there because these are completely made up, imaginary values. They’re simply there to illustrate one way for manufacturers and dealers to share objective, quantifiable information about how their different ADAS systems behave. If it’s done right, it might help a car shopper get a better feel for how their next car might drive, and prevent them from spending their hard-earned cash on a car that drives like an idiot. Or a maniac.

That’s my take, anyway – what’s yours? Head down to the comments and let us know what values you’d like to see represented on an ADAS scorecard, and how much you’d be willing to base your next car buying decision on how it drives.

As for me, my X handle might be VolvoJo, but if I’m shopping for a car that’s going to drive me instead of the other way around, I might have to see if “HondaJo” is available.

Original content from Electrek.

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Fresh TSLA lawsuits, V2X options, and the USAF is blowing up Cybertrucks

Published

9 hours ago

August 7, 2025

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Fresh TSLA lawsuits, V2X options, and the USAF is blowing up Cybertrucks

Elon wants the US military to start buying Tesla Cybertrucks – and now they are! The Air Force has ordered two Cybertruck testers for target practice to determine how easy they are to blow up, while Jo makes up a whole new conspiracy theory on today’s explosive episode of Quick Charge!

Today’s episode is brought to you by retrospec—makers of sleek, powerful e-bikes and outdoor gear built for everyday adventure. Electrek listeners can get 10% off their next ride until August 14 with the exclusive code ELECTREK10 only at retrospec.com.

An it doesn’t stop there. We’ve also got exciting new home battery backup and V2X options for Tesla owners, and one Texas EV driver that decided to conquer the Texas floodwaters by harnessing the awesome combined powers of electrons and stupidity (it’s pretty awesome).

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Tesla’s Dojo supercomputer looks dead as more execs leave for competing startup

Published

10 hours ago

August 7, 2025

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Tesla's Dojo supercomputer looks dead as more execs leave for competing startup

Tesla’s Dojo supercomputer project is reportedly over. Bloomberg reports that CEO Elon Musk is killing the project after a mass exodus of talent from the Dojo team to a competing startup.

Dojo was the name of Tesla’s in-house AI chip development to create supercomputers to train its AI models for self-driving.

Tesla hired a bunch of top chip architects and tried to develop better AI accelerator chips to rely less on companies like NVIDIA, AMD, and others.

It has been running into delays for years.

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We previously reported on significant setbacks. In 2018, Jim Keller, the famed chip architect who was first hired to lead Tesla’s chip-making effort, left the company.

Ganesh Venkataramanan succeeded him, but he left Tesla in 2023.

For the last few years, Peter Bannon, who worked with Keller for years, has been leading Tesla’s chip-making programs, but he is now reportedly also leaving the automaker.

Bloomberg reports that Musk has “ordered the effort to be shut down.”:

Peter Bannon, who was heading up Dojo, is leaving and Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk has ordered the effort to be shut down, according to the people, who asked not to be identified discussing internal matters. The team has lost about 20 workers recently to newly formed DensityAI, and remaining Dojo workers are being reassigned to other data center and compute projects within Tesla, the people said.

DensityAI is a new startup currently in stealth mode, founded by several former Tesla employees, including Venkataramanan.

It reportedly plans to build chips for AI data centers and robots, much like the Dojo program.

The company recently hired 20 former Tesla employees who worked on Dojo.

While the program appeared to be lagging behind for years as Tesla increasingly bought more compute power from NVIDIA, Musk has been claiming progress.

The CEO said in June:

Tesla Dojo AI training computer making progress. We start bringing Dojo 2 online later this year. It takes three major iterations for a new technology to be great. Dojo 2 is good, but Dojo 3 will be great.

During Tesla’s quarterly conference call in late July, the CEO claimed that Dojo 2 will be “operating at scale sometime next year.”

Electrek’s Take

It’s unclear whether the report is accurate or if it’s an extrapolation from the talent exodus to Elon killing Dojo, or if Elon was lying just a few weeks ago.

Alternatively, this development may be so recent that Elon went from being confident in Dojo a few weeks ago to disbanding the team working on it now.

Either way, I think it’s clear that the project has been lagging, and Tesla has been extremely dependent on chip suppliers rather than making its own.

I think Dojo being likely dead is not a big loss for Tesla.

When it comes to chip making, developing its own inference compute for onboard “AI computers” was always the more important project.

TSMC is set to produce Tesla’s new AI5 chip, which is coming soon, and we have recently learned that Samsung will be manufacturing its AI6 chip.

I think the bigger concern from this report is that it’s the latest example of an ongoing exodus of talent at Tesla.

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