Assessment of Integrated Pedestrian Protection Systems with Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) and Passive Safety...

Area of Science:

• Road Safety Engineering
• Automotive Safety Technology
• Injury Biomechanics

Background:

• Autonomous emergency braking (AEB) systems are crucial for pedestrian safety.
• Consumer rating programs like Euro NCAP encourage AEB adoption.
• Integrating AEB assessment with passive safety is needed for comprehensive pedestrian protection.

Purpose of the Study:

• Develop a benefit-based methodology for assessing integrated pedestrian protection systems.
• Incorporate both AEB and passive safety components into a unified assessment.
• Ensure the methodology reflects real-world injury patterns and AEB effectiveness.

Main Methods:

• Calculated societal cost of pedestrian injuries considering AEB speed reduction and passive safety.
• Normalized car costs against a reference car for rating.
• Used AEB test data and Euro NCAP impactor tests with injury risk curves to determine impact speeds and injury probabilities.
• Weighted costs based on accident data and independent AEB benefit estimations.

Main Results:

• AEB significantly reduces pedestrian injury costs, comparable to improving passive safety from poor to average.
• A hypothetical A-pillar airbag demonstrated substantial potential for reducing overall casualty costs.
• The assessment highlighted the importance of head protection in the scuttle and windscreen areas.

Conclusions:

• A novel benefit-based methodology for assessing integrated pedestrian protection systems (AEB and passive safety) has been developed and validated.
• The methodology provides a unified performance assessment by integrating AEB test data and Euro NCAP passive safety test results.
• It accounts for complex interactions, such as altered head impact locations due to AEB-induced speed reductions.