Periodic Reporting for period 4 - NewControl (Integrated, Fail-Operational, Cognitive Perception, Planning and Control Systems for Highly Automated Vehicles)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2022-04-01 do 2023-03-31
Smart mobility is a key grand challenge across the globe, seen as being essential to ensuring sustainable and safe transportation for the world’s population. The drive towards improving sustainability also extends to industries, where smart transport modalities contribute to increasing operational efficiency and decreasing emissions. EU reports estimate that over 90% of road accidents occur due to human-error, for instance, due to erroneous perception, incorrect decision making, distraction, or otherwise. Further, the inability of human drivers to perceive and account for road and environmental factors beyond their line of sight results in inefficient vehicular operation (wasted energy due to frequent stop and go, inefficient path planning, traffic imbalances and congestion).
The essential building blocks for Level 3+ ADFs are now emerging from early ideation stages (TRL1-2), and in the recent past, the field of automated transportation has seen highly publicized developments, often involving experimental vehicles, and unique technology prototypes. However, successfully addressing the grand challenge of safe, efficient, and smart mobility at the global scale requires R&D efforts to be focused on translating novel concepts into commercially viable, mass deployable technologies at TRL 3-5, that can be certified as functionally safe. Importantly, as the concept of automation spreads to other transportation modalities – passenger vehicles, commercial vehicles, industrial vehicles, drones, aircraft – the essential building blocks too will have to evolve towards multi-domain application, satisfying varying constraints and complexity without compromising on safety.
Springing from the aforementioned motivation, the mail goal of NewControl is to:
Deliver fail-operational holistic virtualized platforms for vehicular subsystems that are critical to automated driving (SAE Levels 3+), enabling mobility-as-a-service for next generation highly automated vehicles.
The NewControl project's strategy to achieve its main target consists of four key technical objectives. While these four technical objectives address different levels (components, control systems, architectures and function) of the automation chain, the non-technical objectives address market/social/technological impacts and “European Values”.
Objective 1: Increase the accuracy and robustness of algorithms, E/E architectures for adaptive perception
Objective 2: Increase performance, power, reliability, and reduce cost of the on-board computing platforms used for perception, cognition and control
Objective 3: Achieve certifiability of adaptive algorithms for safety-critical control functions
Objective 4: Develop a generalized hardware abstraction layer for efficient, adaptive fail-operational control of propulsion systems across vehicular platforms
Objective 5: Competitive advantage to European industry
Objective 6: Increase user acceptance of automated control functions
The essential building blocks for Level 3+ ADFs are now emerging from early ideation stages (TRL1-2), and in the recent past, the field of automated transportation has seen highly publicized developments, often involving experimental vehicles, and unique technology prototypes. However, successfully addressing the grand challenge of safe, efficient, and smart mobility at the global scale requires R&D efforts to be focused on translating novel concepts into commercially viable, mass deployable technologies at TRL 3-5, that can be certified as functionally safe. Importantly, as the concept of automation spreads to other transportation modalities – passenger vehicles, commercial vehicles, industrial vehicles, drones, aircraft – the essential building blocks too will have to evolve towards multi-domain application, satisfying varying constraints and complexity without compromising on safety.
Springing from the aforementioned motivation, the mail goal of NewControl is to:
Deliver fail-operational holistic virtualized platforms for vehicular subsystems that are critical to automated driving (SAE Levels 3+), enabling mobility-as-a-service for next generation highly automated vehicles.
The NewControl project's strategy to achieve its main target consists of four key technical objectives. While these four technical objectives address different levels (components, control systems, architectures and function) of the automation chain, the non-technical objectives address market/social/technological impacts and “European Values”.
Objective 1: Increase the accuracy and robustness of algorithms, E/E architectures for adaptive perception
Objective 2: Increase performance, power, reliability, and reduce cost of the on-board computing platforms used for perception, cognition and control
Objective 3: Achieve certifiability of adaptive algorithms for safety-critical control functions
Objective 4: Develop a generalized hardware abstraction layer for efficient, adaptive fail-operational control of propulsion systems across vehicular platforms
Objective 5: Competitive advantage to European industry
Objective 6: Increase user acceptance of automated control functions
Objective 1: Increase the accuracy and robustness of algorithms, E/E architectures for adaptive perception
….
Objective 2: Increase performance, power, reliability, and reduce cost of the on-board computing platforms used for perception, cognition and control
….
Objective 3: Achieve certifiability of adaptive algorithms for safety-critical control functions
….
Objective 4: Develop a generalized hardware abstraction layer for efficient, adaptive fail-operational control of propulsion systems across vehicular platforms
...
….
Objective 2: Increase performance, power, reliability, and reduce cost of the on-board computing platforms used for perception, cognition and control
….
Objective 3: Achieve certifiability of adaptive algorithms for safety-critical control functions
….
Objective 4: Develop a generalized hardware abstraction layer for efficient, adaptive fail-operational control of propulsion systems across vehicular platforms
...
Regarding achieving objectives 1-4, the consortium has already sketched a very detailed collaboration matrix, which is provided to the reviewers, explaining how the various SCs work together, what each SC expects from the other, when is the foreseen delivery date and towards which SC.
To beginn of the project, the loss of nearby all German partner of the consortium cause a ongoing redefinition phase, where SC5 get totally cancelled as the necessary partners stepped out. In parallel the gaps within the SCs and task get closed by introducing additional partner and overtaking of additional work by partners already in the project. Together with the backdated start and delayed kick-off, the project start was very difficult. After M09 also the project coordinating partner get forced by strategic management decision on relocating of project related work also to step out.In this respect, there is now already a very clear plan on how to move forward and what to expect, so as to contribute to overall achieving all NewControl objectives in the end of the project. Never the less the initial plan to deliver the requirements and specification till M12 need to be postponed to M18. In meantime a draft version of the database to not block the work in WP02 to WP04 will be available till M13
Concerning the non-technical objectives, work can be reported as follows:
Objective 5: Competitive advantage to European industry
The SC6 - Adaptive fail-operational control applied to highly automated road vehicles addresses NewControl objective 5
The work in the context of SC6 that contributes to reaching Objective 5 has not yet started officially, as it depends on (and uses inputs from) the Objectives 1-4, so as to collectively work towards providing a competitive advantage to the European industry.
Furthermore, the advantage will be made realistic after the first results start coming out. However, partners within SC6 have been following the NewControl meetings on a normal basis, so as to facilitate the acquisition of all necessary inputs, as described in the DoA.
It is expected that the first contributions of how objective 5 is being reached, will be reported after M24.
Objective 6: Increase user acceptance of automated control functions
In the first year of the project the focus of the impact supply chain SC7 “Virtual twin approaches for validation, certification and qualification” was on develop validation, certification and qualification for components in terms of SAE levels by making use of virtual twins, a virtualized co-simulation platform that allows the testing of hardware in a virtual environment. The related specifications and requirements for the demonstrators developed in SC6. The related work is ongoing in the 1.7.
Moreover, SC8 that also contributes to objective 6 is just started and will provide some results till the review.
To beginn of the project, the loss of nearby all German partner of the consortium cause a ongoing redefinition phase, where SC5 get totally cancelled as the necessary partners stepped out. In parallel the gaps within the SCs and task get closed by introducing additional partner and overtaking of additional work by partners already in the project. Together with the backdated start and delayed kick-off, the project start was very difficult. After M09 also the project coordinating partner get forced by strategic management decision on relocating of project related work also to step out.In this respect, there is now already a very clear plan on how to move forward and what to expect, so as to contribute to overall achieving all NewControl objectives in the end of the project. Never the less the initial plan to deliver the requirements and specification till M12 need to be postponed to M18. In meantime a draft version of the database to not block the work in WP02 to WP04 will be available till M13
Concerning the non-technical objectives, work can be reported as follows:
Objective 5: Competitive advantage to European industry
The SC6 - Adaptive fail-operational control applied to highly automated road vehicles addresses NewControl objective 5
The work in the context of SC6 that contributes to reaching Objective 5 has not yet started officially, as it depends on (and uses inputs from) the Objectives 1-4, so as to collectively work towards providing a competitive advantage to the European industry.
Furthermore, the advantage will be made realistic after the first results start coming out. However, partners within SC6 have been following the NewControl meetings on a normal basis, so as to facilitate the acquisition of all necessary inputs, as described in the DoA.
It is expected that the first contributions of how objective 5 is being reached, will be reported after M24.
Objective 6: Increase user acceptance of automated control functions
In the first year of the project the focus of the impact supply chain SC7 “Virtual twin approaches for validation, certification and qualification” was on develop validation, certification and qualification for components in terms of SAE levels by making use of virtual twins, a virtualized co-simulation platform that allows the testing of hardware in a virtual environment. The related specifications and requirements for the demonstrators developed in SC6. The related work is ongoing in the 1.7.
Moreover, SC8 that also contributes to objective 6 is just started and will provide some results till the review.