Research issues in Eco-driving

Transport is a key economic sector, supporting economic development and growth, and facilitating exchange. At the same time, motor vehicles are major emitters of gaseous and particulate pollution in urban areas. The transport industry’s quest to limit its impact on the environment and improve road safety continues to drive policy, research and development. Eco-driving is a well-established, affordable and simple behavioural change intervention, which could reduce fuel consumption up to 20%. Fully electric vehicles are predicted to be available for the mass market by 2020, however an energy efficient driving style will still be necessary for these vehicles due to a relatively poor battery performance. Furthermore Eco-driving could be applied to electric or thermal vehicles. Despite a widespread adoption of Eco-driving, its safety benefits have not been clearly established. This paper discusses research issues related to Eco-driving interventions. It covers policy, industry practice and research approaches ranging from education to invehicle technology. This paper demonstrates the lack of comprehensive systemic research analyzing the impacts of Eco-driving on road safety. Most of the methods used to assess the benefits of eco-driving lack scientific rigour and have methodological shortcomings. Ecological Driving Assistance Systems (EDAS) has emerged as a viable ITS intervention addressing Eco-driving but the associated Human Machine Interface is still neglected. Furthermore, there is not enough research assessing the long-term effects of Eco-driving driving. INTRODUCTION Transport is a key economic sector, supporting economic development and growth, and facilitating the exchange of goods. However, transport could damage the health of humans and the planet by creating road trauma, air pollution and greenhouse gases. Reductions in road trauma in Australia and across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) have stalled in the last five years and innovative interventions are needed to address this impasse. At the same time, passenger and freight travel are growing, with consequent increases in gaseous and particulate pollution in urban areas which have serious health effects, including respiratory and cardiovascular diseases Eco-driving attempts to change drivers’ behaviour through advice such as driving more smoothly by anticipating changes in the traffic, shifting gear sooner, operating the vehicle within an optimum range of engine revolutions, avoiding jerky braking/acceleration and avoiding traffic congestion. Many countries have promoted Eco-driving as a key element of national strategies to reduce CO2 emissions but have not examined the safety effects (ECODRIVEN, 2009). European Union regulations already require Eco-driving to be taught to novice drivers. Japan achieved its 2010 goal of reducing CO2 emissions by 31 million tons below 2001 levels by encouraging drivers to use their vehicles more efficiently through Eco-driving (Transport America, 2010). The claimed advantages of the Ecodriving approach are that it can apply to vehicles of any age or size, it can take effect across the entire fleet of vehicles immediately at low cost (as opposed to being phased in), and that it can result in immediate savings to individuals from greater fuel efficiency, better safety and perhaps lower insurance rates (Barkenbus, 2010). TECHNOLOGICAL LIMITATIONS Eco-driving goals are easily pushed to the background when they conflict with other goals, particularly goals related to safety and time saving (Dogan et al., 2011). Helping the driver to choose the best compromise between safety and CO2 reduction driving techniques can be the goal of a new type of advanced systems called ecological driving assistance