Volvo calls for ‘unified’ vehicle safety standards
Åsa Haglund, head of the Volvo Cars Safety Centre, recently told Automotive News Canada that there should be unified vehicle safety standards, regardless of the market location.
Even though road attributes vary worldwide, crash outcomes are the same, she said, according to the article.
She added, “Why would we have different standards? …There are areas where the U.S. standards are stricter than the European ones and then there are other areas where European ones are stricter than U.S. ones.
“Let’s compare them, and let’s apply the strictest one to all the markets.”
Haglund added that Volvo’s internal safety standards are applied to its models globally, with some unique characteristics added to ensure specific legal requirements in each country.
The article states that a brief “mutual recognition” of vehicle standards between the U.S. and European Union in July has “pressed governments and auto stakeholders in both regions to consider the question;” however, “exactly how harmonizing standards would be achieved is unclear.”
In October, the publication reported that amid trade tensions with the U.S. and rising vehicle affordability challenges, the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA) is pushing for Canada to open its borders for vehicle imports from automakers that design them to meet European, Japanese, and South Korean safety standards.
“The move would be a historic departure from Canada’s automotive alignment with the United States and likely require changes to federal legislation governing the Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (CVMSS), which have for decades closely mirrored the U.S. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS),” the article states.
“Tim Reuss, CEO of the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA), which pitched broadening Canada’s standards in April, said the movement is gaining momentum. Dealers, consumers, and ‘quite a few’ automakers are eager to see change, he said.”
Also in October, Haglund noted that when it comes to overall vehicle safety, using sensors to avoid crashes “means the world.”
“Every step of understanding more of the external world, I think, is pivotal, but we also need to know what’s going on inside the vehicle and if the driver is paying attention,” she said. “If we don’t know what the driver is focused on, it’s really, really hard to tell an intentional tight move from something that could end up being dangerous.
“At the same time, we know that humans aren’t going to trust a system that is only right every second time or so. We know we need to be right 8 out of 10 times, at least, for a system to be effective… The aim is to make the best possible safety solution with the least amount of tech, otherwise we just add complexity to the car. Whenever possible, we use existing sensors.”
Eighty-one percent of Canadians who responded to a survey fielded by Volvo Car Canada earlier this year said vehicle safety ratings influence their purchasing decisions; however, that doesn’t always translate into confidence or action behind the wheel.
Forty percent said they’re “completely confident” that their current vehicle would protect them in a crash, and among younger drivers, that number drops further. Confidence is lowest among Gen Z (32%) and highest among Boomers (48%).
Volvo’s latest safety innovation is the world’s first multi-adaptive safety belt, which will debut in the fully electric Volvo EX60 next year.
The multi-adaptive safety belt merges together our vision of safety for the new era of vehicles and technology,” Haglund told Automotive News Canada in October. “It is a refinement of the three-point safety belt Volvo pioneered in 1959.
“But now, sensors can understand what’s going on outside the car and who’s sitting inside it. When a crash is unavoidable, we use these sensors to calculate the available space inside the cabin and make the most of it. The multi-adaptive safety belt applies only the force necessary to stop occupants, minimizing injury and individualizing protection.”
She added that Volvo plans to keep refining the belt to make it better.
“Whatever we learn from real-world results, we can apply using over-the-air updates to make the fleet safer,” she said.
The company is also leveraging data to improve safety, now with AI and machine learning, to analyze billions of real-time data points, accelerating the company toward its goal of zero collisions and pushing safety innovations to new heights, according to the release.
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Featured image: Volvo EX30 badge (Provided by Volvo)