Swiss Testing Drone Delivery
Swiss Post, Swiss WorldCargo and Matternet are jointly testing the commercial use of logistics drones. The three companies are investigating specific uses of drone technology and examining the cost-effectiveness of these business ideas. They will be carrying out drone tests in July 2015 for this purpose. The widespread use of drones is not expected within the next five years. The focus is primarily on their use in exceptional cases or the transport of special items.
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Driverless Taxis may Help Mitigate Climate Change
Imagine a fleet of driverless taxis roaming your city, ready to pick you up and take you to your destination at a moment's notice. While this may seem fantastical, it may be only a matter of time before it becomes reality. And according to a new study from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), such a system would both be cost-effective and greatly reduce per-mile emissions of greenhouse gases.
The analysis found that the per-mile greenhouse gas emissions of an electric vehicle deployed as a self-driving, or autonomous, taxi in 2030 would be 63 to 82 percent lower than a projected 2030 hybrid vehicle driven as a privately owned car and 90 percent lower than a 2014 gasoline-powered private vehicle. Almost half of the savings is attributable to "right-sizing," where the size of the taxi deployed is tailored to each trip's occupancy needs.
The results were published online today by Nature Climate Change in an article titled, "Autonomous taxis could greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions of U.S. light-duty vehicles," co-authored by Berkeley Lab scientists Jeffery Greenblatt and Samveg Saxena.
"When we first started looking at autonomous vehicles, we found that, of all the variables we could consider, the use of autonomous vehicles as part of a shared transit system seemed to be the biggest lever that pointed to lower energy use per mile," said Greenblatt.
Many automakers and other companies are working on autonomous cars. Right-sizing is cost-effective for both the fleet owner and for passengers, and small one- and two-seat vehicles are being explored by researchers and companies. To illustrate the concept, consider a single passenger with no luggage versus a party of four passengers with suitcases. The single passenger would require a much smaller taxi than the party of four, saving money for vehicle owners and passengers. Right-sizing, of course, assumes a fleet of taxis managed by a single entity.
"Most trips in the U.S. are taken singly, meaning one- or two-seat cars would satisfy most trips," Greenblatt said. "That gives us a factor of two savings, since smaller vehicles means reduced energy use and greenhouse gas emissions."
Another factor contributing to lower emissions for autonomous taxis is a cleaner electric grid. By 2030 power plants are expected to be using more renewable energy and emitting less pollution, meaning the greenhouse gas intensity of electricity will be lower.
Self-driving cars have additional efficiencies that have been covered in other research, such as the ability to drive closely behind other autonomous cars to reduce wind resistance ("platooning"), optimally routing trips, and smoother acceleration and braking. "These are all incremental, but they do add up," Greenblatt said. "However, we didn't even include these effects in our baseline results, and we still get huge savings without them."
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