The study, developed by a team of experts of the Technical University of Berlin (TUB), is based on the concept of the automatic green light. Cars are driven on the right roads at the correct speed, avoiding pointless stops and acceleration mainly caused by red traffic lights. This results in unchanged or sometimes even earlier arrival times as well as lower fuel consumption, and therefore less CO2 emissions, the researchers say.
Several studies have shown that fuel consumption can be significantly reduced through different driving behaviour. In some cases the potential emission cut has been estimated to be as high as 50%.
The TUB study shows that cars equipped with a simple satellite navigation system, such as GPS or the projected EU-sponsored Galileo, can easily be directed to less congested roads - and not just via the shortest routes, which satellite navigation already allows.
The difference is the new car-embedded software, which collects data on traffic during the journey. The device calculates the timing of traffic lights and identifies the programmed 'green-waves' in order to advise to drivers of the speed at which they should drive to avoid red lights.
Nevertheless, at the moment even the researchers themselves concede there are the limits to the new approach, in particular due to the limited data available. The simulations have so far only been carried out in Berlin during a very limited number of trips. Moreover, the software is not yet able to distinguish stops caused by traffic lights from other delays.
The project is being discussed at the 'Internet of Things' conference in Zurich (26-28 March), which brings together academic and industrial experts on new technologies such as Radio Frequency Identification tags (RFID), short-range wireless communications, real-time localisation and sensor networks.
The mass deployment of these devices will allow new communication not only between humans and things but also among things, therefore creating a new and well developed concept of the Internet, the so-called 'Internet of Things'.
The conference also presents other relevant projects that offer new uses of ICT to fight environment pollution and climate change, in line with the recently-developed EU approaches (see EurActiv 22/02/08 and our Links Dossier on climate change).
Some of the projects selected at EU level for environmentally friendly applications of new technologies are also being debated in Zurich. Among these are the use of RFID tags to track products throughout their entire life-cycle and systems to attribute carbon credits or debits to individuals according to their environmental behaviour.
The French Presidency of the EU, which will start on 1 July 2008, has already planned a conference on the 'Internet of Things', scheduled to take place from 6-7 October 2008 in Nice.
