Experts at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers say that technology is available that would theoretically eliminate up to 90 percent of all traffic crashes experienced on U.S. roads.
The world's largest technical professional association, IEEE claims that with 90 percent of all traffic crashes caused by driver error, existing transportation technologies could be incorporated into vehicles and roads everywhere that would eliminate the error causing the majority of these car accidents.
"Today's advanced embedded systems, sensors, microprocessors and control technologies have made our vehicles and roads significantly safer, but integrating them into our vehicles and roads has been a slow process," said Dr. Azim Eskandarian, IEEE member. "However, within 10 years, as technology costs continue to fall and implementation of these technologies increases, we could see significant improvements in vehicle safety, efficiency, and energy conservation – especially in developing parts of the world where high-end cars are not yet affordable by the general public."
Some of the technology available for use in cars for the benefit of drivers everywhere include in-vehicle machine vision and sensors that function to detect drowsy drivers prone to accidents as well as warning systems that detect sudden lane departure and vehicle-to-infrastructure and vehicle-to-vehicle communications systems for the safety of the driver and others in the vicinity.
"Many governments are establishing new emissions and fuel efficiency standards for vehicle manufacturers to meet in the next ten years," said Matt Barth of the IEEE. "The integration of ECO-ITS technologies – such as eco-routing into our vehicles – will be an important evolution in further reducing carbon emissions, achieving greater fuel efficiency, and strengthening energy independence."
Although many accidents are caused by driver error, some are the result of intentional error and others the result of accidental error. According to a recent poll by PEMCO Insurance, the majority of drivers know exactly how many miles per hour above the speed limit they can go without drawing the unwanted attention from police. "The buffer zone" is taken advantage of by many drivers and can lead to unnecessary accidents.