21 November 2013
eCoMove Session III – Driver focus
The second day of the eCoMove final event started with a morning session dedicated to the driver.
Joakim Gudmunsen (Go Green) explained the training strategies needed to look at how to motivate the driver to make a driving behaviour change possible. Eco-driving is a not a new technique, it has been there for 15 years and it is influenced by 3 factors: human, organisational, and cultural.
The final goal for truck companies should be to have a long term strategy which can produce effective results over a long period of time. Nevertheless the approach used so far has to change into a bottom-up model starting from the human factor. Drivers need to understand the aim of the project and of the training before the training starts. The motivation of the driver is fundamental in the success of training and, on a long term run, to achieve fuel savings.
Florian Krietsch (PTV group) focused on the eCoMove applications on freight and logistics (included in the sub-project 4). There are some challenges and limitations for the mobility of heavy vehicles and trucks in urban areas. These challenges are based for instance on restrictions to access certain areas or unpredictable events such as congestion and incidents on the route. To address these issues, eCoMove has adopted an integrated approach by combining several applications and which includes a communication between the vehicle and the traffic management centre. It is indeed the centre that assesses the planned trip and according to specific criteria gives the green light or not to the truck.
In the same presentation, Stephane Dreher (HERE) illustrated the ecoNavigation application which consists in finding the most efficient fuel/CO2 emission route. The aim is to minimise the fuel consumption by calculating type of vehicles and driver behaviour.
Luisa Andreone (CRF) highlighted that the devices and services capable of giving information about driving and fuel consumption are already on the market but in the near future this data will have to be combined with information coming from the surrounding infrastructure.
eCoMove created several applications and tested them on drivers; although studies on drivers were carried out for a short period of time, the feedback received was very positive. In addition to this, the results showed a significant fuel saving figure down from 5% to 15% depending on the driving context.
Guillaume Vernet (Volvo Group) focused on the applications for trucks and on the specific application ecoDriverCoaching, an in-vehicle system that provides real-time advice to the driver. The communication between the vehicle and the traffic management centre also here is fundamental. The interesting part of this particular application is the possibility for the driver to review their performance (in the post-trip phase) and see concretely how much fuel they saved. This is another way to stimulate and motivate drivers, a point that come out as very important throughout all the presentations of this first morning session.
eCoMove Session IV – Network focus
Session IV focus on the eCoMove applications and results related to the network.
Jonas Lussmann (YUM) focused on the two applications ecoParking Advice and ecoTruck Parking.The ecoTruck parking application provides information on the availability of parking spots along motorways as well as detecting and informing of parking spaces. This allows drivers to approach directly the free space without having to look for one.
The ecoParking Advice application provides the selection of the destination and the route to follow in order to reach which is updated with information on incidents or congestion on the way in real-time.
Ronald van Katwijk (TNO) and Robbin Blokpoel (Imteech/PEEK) explained in details three applications related to intersections on road: ecoBalanced Priority, ecoApproach Advice and GreenWave. All the results were calculated for the peak hours and off-peak hours.
The ecoBalanced Priority application gives information on what happens before the stop line so on the delay of the break at intersections.
The number of stops on a network has a real big impact on CO2 emissions and that is why it’s important to reduce the number of decelerations and stops. The GreenWave application is built on this concept and has proved a reduction of CO2 in main roads especially.
eCoMove Session V – Backbone and results
The last session of the eCoMove final event focused in details on the communication platform and the core messages used by the project in the applications.
Ola Martin Lykkja (Q-Free) summarised the communication platform structure which is based on ISO and ETSI specifications and standards messages. The main challenge of the project is in the border crossing message is challenging when a vehicle is driving from one regulatory and juridical region to another.
Francesco Alesiani (NEC Labs) focused on the eco-messages (V2V and V2I short-range and long range single vehicle communication). He mentioned the vehicle path message (VPM) which allows recording the history of the vehicle and its destination and it is therefore useful to predict future paths.
Johannes Stille (HERE) introduced the concept of ecoMap which is a collection of location data on a large European scale which collects different types of data (static, ADAS, speed, dynamic – including traffic signals, events/incidents, flow and emissions).
Models to describe, predict and optimise traffic and to give driver recommendations that can reduce CO2 emissions were presented by Philipp Themann (IKA) and Isabel Wilmink(TNO). These models are the ecoSituational Model which considers data already present and combines them with the driving environment model. This model can give a prediction of the velocity trajectory and to predict the average behaviour.
Isabel Wilmink (TNO) focused on the two models ecoStrategic Model (tested in Helmond) and ecoNetwork Prediction (in Munich). The two models indicate the real-time status of the traffic, predict the traffic in the next 15-30 minutes, calculate the emissions, determine if the routes chosen are efficient, and if not to re-route the vehicles to more efficient roads.
Maria Staubach (DLR) presented the results of the impact assessment study. She gave an overview of the test trails and the analysis of the inefficiencies related to environment, mobility, and safety. The results showed that overall there was a good acceptance of the system.
This is the end of the event and the end of a successful project that has demonstrated that can contribute largely to CO2 reductions. Systems can be improved and all stakeholders need to continue to cooperate together in order to have the applications and services established with eCoMove further developed.
