Driverless Cars Are Giving Engineers a Fuel Economy Headache (bloomberg.com)

schwit1 shares a report from Bloomberg: Judging from General Motors' test cars and Elon Musk's predictions, the world is headed toward a future that's both driverless and all-electric. In reality, autonomy and battery power could end up being at odds. That's because self-driving technology is a huge power drain. Some of today's prototypes for fully autonomous systems consume two to four kilowatts of electricity -- the equivalent of having 50 to 100 laptops continuously running in the trunk, according to BorgWarner Inc. The supplier of vehicle propulsion systems expects the first autonomous cars -- likely robotaxis that are constantly on the road -- will be too energy-hungry to run on battery power alone. A fully autonomous subcompact car like a Honda Fit, for example, will get 54.6 miles to the gallon in 2025 in the best-case scenario, more than 5 miles below the U.S. emissions target, according to BorgWarner. A small pickup or SUV would be at 45.8 mpg, versus a target of 50. Engineers don't have much time to resolve this, as companies are planning to deploy their first fully self-driving cars in the next couple of years. One way for automakers to meet the power-hungry needs of self-driving systems will be to use gasoline-electric hybrid models rather than purely electric cars, said Mary Gustanski, chief technology officer of supplier Delphi Automotive Plc's powertrain business.

Comments

Didn't consider miniaturization? Moore's Law?

[bit trollent]

Really? These engineers didn't consider that processing power is constantly shrinking and becoming more efficient?

I feel like I'm reading an article from 30 years ago about how computers will never fit inside your home because the take up large rooms!

Nonsense

[crow]

This is calculations based on wild assumptions about what is actually required for self-driving. If Tesla is right, then they can do it with the hardware that is already shipping, so power is not an issue--they just need to finish the software. You can also look at what Nvidia just released that they're billing as being designed for self-driving cars. AMD is apparently working on a similar product.

This sounds like a typical naysayer making stuff up to get attention (and advertising hits).