The head of the US National Highway Safety Administration, Nicole Nason has urged the United Nations to take global action to promote the crash avoidance technology, Electronic Stability Control (ESC). Speaking at the UN World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Standards in Geneva in November, the NHTSA Administrator proposed a global technical regulation be adopted for ESC, which she described “as the greatest life saving technology since the seat belt”.
ESC systems use automatic, computer controlled braking of individual wheels to assist the driver to retain control of a vehicle that is skidding sideways. It is estimated that if all US light vehicles were equipped with the system as many as 10,300 lives would be saved and up to 252,000 injuries would be prevented. In September the NHTSA proposed a Federal Rule that will make ESC standard for all light vehicles by the 2012 model year. Now the NHTSA is requesting that an international standard be developed using the UN Vehicle Standards Forum also known as the UNECE Working Party 29.
In Europe the FIA Foundation’s Director General David Ward is chairing a new public/private partnership ‘eSafety Aware’ that will launch a campaign to promote ESC next year. The campaign, ‘Choose ESC!’ will encourage the public to buy cars that are equipped with electronic stability control. At present the penetration of ESC across new vehicle fleets in Europe remains at 40% and much lower in the smaller car classes. In 2005, for example, only 6% of small family cars had ESC available as a standard fit. Welcoming Nicole Nason’s proposal for a global standard, David Ward said that “this is an excellent initiative by the NHTSA which will make it more likely that before too long all new cars in the USA, Europe, and elsewhere will have ESC as a standard life saving feature”.
Download Remarks by Nicole R. Nason at UN World Forum for Harmonisation of Vehicle Standards (doc) >
Download NHTSA Rule making proposal for ESC (pdf) >