NEW ASSESSMENT AND TESTING METHODOLOGY FOR VEHICLE TYPE APPROVAL - PART 2

The following is the second of a three-part series produced by Carlos Lujan Tutusaus, Senior Manager of Homologation, Commercial Vehicles, Automated Driving and Vehicle Dynamics in Applus IDIADA and Oriol Flix Viñas, Homologation Engineer, Commercial Vehicles, Automated Driving & Vehicle Dynamics in Applus IDIADA.

- Carlos Lujan Tutusaus and Oriol Flix Viñas

This article describes the main future trends about the new assessment and testing methodologies for the type-approval of vehicles and their systems. The first part of the article introduced the context, as well as the challenge of automated vehicle type approval.

THE RULE MAKING STRUCTURE 

The main activities concerning the definition of type approval of automated driving vehicles for the European Union market are being developed in two different forums:

THE EUROPEAN COMMISION 

The European Commission (EU) is responsible for the definition of vehicle type approval within the European Union. Currently, Regulation (EU) 2018/858, defines the framework for the administrative provisions and technical requirements that road vehicles, separate technical units and components need to comply with, to be placed in the market. In addition to that, such regulation also establishes the provisions for other procedures that guarantee life-cycle compliance, like conformity of production and market surveillance. On a second level, we can find a series of regulatory tools which support the framework regulation, using amending, supplementing or implementing it.

One of the most important regulatory tools is Regulation (EU), 2019/2144 on type-approval requirements for motor vehicles and their trailers, and systems, components and separate technical units intended for such vehicles, as regards their general safety and the protection of vehicles occupants and vulnerable road users.

This regulation, also known as General Safety Regulation 2 (GSR2) introduces a series of mandatory systems that the vehicles have had to equip from July 2022 onwards. But most importantly, for this article, it defines a series of requirements that will need to be met by automated and fully automated vehicles.