METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR REGULATING TRAFFIC EMISSIONS ACROSS A STREET NETWORK

Abstract

A method for regulating traffic emissions across a street network comprises calculating, by an external control entity, a real-time location-dependent immission load across the street network based on at least one of environmental data, traffic data and configuration data of the street network, providing, by motor vehicles using the street network, navigation data characterizing a route of each respective motor vehicle along the street network and emission data characterizing exhaust emission levels of each respective motor vehicle along its route, and calculating an optimized driving route for each motor vehicle along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the exhaust emission levels of the motor vehicles. The optimized driving route is calculated by the external control entity and transmitted to each motor vehicle via a wireless communication network, or wherein the optimized driving route is calculated by an internal control unit of each respective motor vehicle.

Claims

1. A method for regulating traffic emissions across a street network, the method comprising: calculating, by an external control entity, a real-time location-dependent immission load across the street network based on at least one of environmental data, traffic data and configuration data of the street network; providing, by a plurality of motor vehicles using the street network, navigation data characterizing a route of each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network, and emission data characterizing exhaust emission levels of each of the plurality of motor vehicles along a route; and calculating an optimized driving route for each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the plurality of motor vehicles; wherein the optimized driving routes are calculated by the external control entity and transmitted to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via a wireless communication network; or wherein the optimized driving routes are calculated by an internal control unit of each of the plurality of motor vehicles.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the optimized driving routes are calculated by the external control entity and transmitted to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via a wireless communication network; and wherein the optimized driving routes are calculated by an internal control unit of each of the plurality of motor vehicles.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of motor vehicles transmits the navigation data or the emission data to the external control entity via the wireless communication network.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the external control entity transmits information about the calculated immission load to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via the wireless communication network.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the optimized driving routes of the motor vehicles are calculated by taking into account at least one of a variable operation mode of each of the plurality of motor vehicles and a battery status of a traction battery of the each of the plurality of motor vehicles.

6. The method according to claim 5, wherein the plurality of motor vehicles are provided with an optimized operation scheme to be followed on the optimized driving route.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the optimized driving routes of the plurality of motor vehicles are calculated to minimize the immission load or to keep the immission load below a predefined threshold at least in predefined emission zones of the street network.

8. A system for regulating traffic emissions across a street network), the system comprising: an external control entity configured to calculate a real-time location-dependent immission load across the street network based on at least one of environmental data, traffic data, and configuration data of the street network; and a plurality of motor vehicles using the street network, each of the plurality of motor vehicles being configured to provide navigation data characterizing a route of each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network, and emission data characterizing exhaust emission levels of each of the plurality of motor vehicles along a route; wherein the external control entity is configured to calculate an optimized driving route for each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the plurality of motor vehicles, and to transmit the optimized driving routes to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via a wireless communication network; or wherein an internal control unit of each of the plurality of motor vehicles is configured to calculate an optimized driving route for each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the plurality of motor vehicles.

9. The system according to claim 8, wherein the external control entity is configured to calculate an optimized driving route for each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the plurality of motor vehicles, and to transmit the optimized driving routes to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via a wireless communication network; and wherein an internal control unit of each of the plurality of motor vehicles is configured to calculate an optimized driving route for each of the plurality of motor vehicles along the street network based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the plurality of motor vehicles.

10. The system according to claim 8, wherein each of the plurality of motor vehicles is configured to transmit the navigation data or the emission data to the external control entity via the wireless communication network.

11. The system according to claim 8, wherein the external control entity is configured to transmit information about the calculated immission load to each of the plurality of motor vehicles via the wireless communication network.

12. The system according to claim 8, wherein the optimized driving routes of the plurality of motor vehicles are calculated taking into account at least one of a variable operation mode of each of the plurality of motor vehicles, and a battery status of a traction battery of each of the plurality of motor vehicles.

13. The system according to claim 12, wherein the plurality of motor vehicles are provided with an optimized operation scheme to be followed on the optimized driving route.

14. The system according to claim 8, wherein the optimized driving routes of the plurality of motor vehicles are calculated to minimize the immission load or to keep the immission load below a predefined threshold at least in predefined emission zones of the street network.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

[0029] The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of the present disclosure and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate the embodiments of the present disclosure and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the disclosure. Other embodiments of the present disclosure and many of the intended advantages of the present disclosure will be readily appreciated as they become better understood by reference to the following detailed description. The elements of the drawings are not necessarily to scale relative to each other. In the figures, like reference numerals denote like or functionally like components, unless indicated otherwise.

[0030] FIG. 1 schematically depicts a motor vehicle driving through a street network, which is controlled by a system for regulating traffic emissions according to an embodiment of the disclosure.

[0031] FIG. 2 schematically shows the system used in FIG. 1.

[0032] FIG. 3 shows a flow diagram of a method for regulating traffic emissions with the system of FIG. 2.

[0033] Although specific embodiments are illustrated and described herein, it will be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art that a variety of alternate and/or equivalent implementations may be substituted for the specific embodiments shown and described without departing from the scope of the present disclosure. Generally, this application is intended to cover any adaptations or variations of the specific embodiments discussed herein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0034] FIG. 1 schematically depicts a motor vehicle 2 driving through a street network 17, which is controlled by a system 10 for regulating traffic emissions according to an embodiment of the disclosure. FIG. 2 schematically shows the system 10 used in FIG. 1, while FIG. 3 depicts a flow diagram of a method M for regulating traffic emissions with the system 10 of FIG. 2. The street network 17 may be, for example, an urban area with increased traffic in at least certain subareas or hotspots, e.g. main streets, cross roads, highways etc. The street network 17 may thus be subject to traffic congestion problems and the related air quality problems due to emissions of internal combustion engines of the vehicles.

[0035] The presently described method M and system 10 improve this situation by providing an online traffic guidance to optimize traffic flow, to minimize emission hot spots and to distribute immission load over the whole city area (that is, the street network 17) more homogenously in order to comply with the stringent air quality limits imposed in certain European and/or worldwide regions and to reduce total greenhouse gas and harmful emissions. The present concept may particularly help to avoid driving bans in heavily frequented urban areas.

[0036] To this end, the system 10 comprises an external control entity 1, e.g. a computing center, service provider and/or authority of the respective city, which is configured to calculate a real-time current and/or predictive location-dependent immission load across the street network 17 based on various relevant data including but not limited to environmental data 15, traffic data 16, and configuration data 14 of the street network 17.

[0037] The external control entity 1 may employ an Operational Street Pollution Model (OSPM) for the above purpose, e.g. to calculate actual and/or predictive immission load maps using information such as traffic flow and density, weather condition and air quality measurement stations. It is to be understood however that the external control entity 1 may also use other suitable models or computational approaches to calculate or estimate the immission load of the street network 17.

[0038] Environmental data 15 may comprise, for example, real-time information about the current or anticipated weather, climate, smog and/or pollution levels along the streets of the street network 17 and so on. These data may include measurements conducted across the street network 17 via corresponding measurement/sensing equipment. As an example, FIG. 1 shows two environment sensors 9 to illustrate this aspect.

[0039] Configuration data 14 of the street network 17 may comprise any relevant information on the street network 17, e.g. street arrangement, street geometries, street constants, road blockings and/or construction sites and so on.

[0040] Traffic data 16 may comprise any information defining the current or anticipated traffic situation across the street network 17, e.g. traffic flow, congestions, accidents etc.

[0041] The external control entity 1 may be communicatively coupled to motor vehicles 2 using the street network 17, e.g. via wireless V2X communication. The motor vehicles 2 may also use this or another network to communicate with each other.

[0042] Each motor vehicle 2 is configured to provide navigation data 11 characterizing a route of the respective motor vehicle 2 along the street network 17, e.g. destinations, and emission data 12 characterizing exhaust emission levels of the respective motor vehicle 2 along its route, e.g. vehicle emission class, current and/or predictive exhaust emission levels etc. The vehicles 2 may provide real-time information on these aspects by employing an onboard monitoring system and/or predictive energy management system, which may be coupled or integrated in an assisted/autonomous/automatic driving system of the respective vehicle 2.

[0043] By way of example, FIG. 1 shows a plug-in hybrid vehicle 2 having an internal combustion engine 6 and an electric-vehicle battery 3 controlled by a battery control unit 4, which in turn is communicatively coupled to an internal control unit 5 of the vehicle 2. The internal control unit 5 may be part of and/or be coupled to an onboard monitoring system, predictive energy management system and/or assisted/autonomous/automatic driving system of the vehicle 2 as mentioned above. The internal control unit 5 is connected to a communication unit 7 of the vehicle 2, which is configured to connect to a wireless network in order to exchange the navigation data and the emission data with the external control entity 1. The external control entity 1 in turn may provide the vehicle 2 with information about the calculated immission load via the wireless network.

[0044] The system 10 now provides two strategies for using the above information from the external control entity 1 and the motor vehicles 2 to regulate the traffic flow across the street network 17 such that it becomes more homogenous and emission hot spots are suppressed or completely avoided. It will be clear to the person of skill in the following that both approaches may also be combined with each other.

[0045] On the one hand, the external control entity 1 may be configured to calculate an optimized driving route 13 for each motor vehicle 2 along the street network 17 based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the motor vehicles 2 and to transmit the optimized driving routes 13 to the respective motor vehicles 2 via a wireless communication network. The optimized driving routes 13 may be provided as driving recommendations for manually driven vehicles and may be displaced to the driver on a driver interface 8, e.g. on a display on a dashboard or the like. In case of autonomous or automatic driving, the optimized driving routes 13 may be provided as driving commands, which are then implemented by the respective system of each vehicle 2.

[0046] On the other hand, the internal control unit 5 of each motor vehicle 2 may be configured to calculate an optimized driving route 13 for the respective motor vehicle 2 along the street network 17 based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the motor vehicles 2. Hence, in that case the vehicles 2 themselves may be responsible for the calculation of the optimal route. In that case, the external control unit 1 may merely provide relevant information about the immission load required to determine an optimized route.

[0047] The optimized driving routes 13 of the motor vehicles 2 can be calculated to minimize the immission load and/or to keep the immission load below a predefined threshold at least in predefined emission zones of the street network 17. For example, a route optimization may be performed to reduce air pollution across the street network 17 or at least in certain zones of the network 17, e.g. with respect to particulate, matter, nitrogen oxides and so on.

[0048] The corresponding method M shown on FIG. 3 may comprise under M1 calculating, by the external control entity 1, the real-time location-dependent immission load across the street network 17 based on at least one of environmental data 15, traffic data 16 and configuration data 14 of the street network 17. The method M may further comprise under M2 providing, by the motor vehicles 2 using the street network 17, navigation data 11 characterizing a route of each respective motor vehicle 2 along the street network 17 and emission data 12 characterizing exhaust emission levels of each respective motor vehicle 2 along its route. The method M may further comprise under M3 calculating the optimized driving route 13 for each motor vehicle 2 along the street network 17 based on the calculated immission load and the emission data of the motor vehicles 2.

[0049] The optimized driving routes 13 of the motor vehicles 2 may generally be calculated taking into account a variable operation mode of each motor vehicle 2 and/or a battery status of a traction battery 3 of the respective motor vehicle 2. The motor vehicles 2 may then be provided with an optimized operation scheme to be followed on the optimized driving route 13. For example, the vehicles 2 may follow a certain optimized route together with a corresponding sequence of specified operation modes, e.g. a certain speed profile and/or requests for electric driving instead of ICE driving. Different emission zones may be defined along the route of each vehicle 2, which may impose certain restrictions, e.g. on ICE driving, so that the operation mode may depend on the current emission zone.

[0050] As a result, a traffic guidance is provided that helps to minimize emission hot spots and to distribute immission load over an urban area more homogenously to comply with stringent air quality limits in Europe/worldwide, to reduce total greenhouse gas and harmful emissions and to avoid driving bans. The present approach may help to improve overall air quality inside cities, thereby improving the quality of life of urban residents.

[0051] In the foregoing detailed description, various features are grouped together in one or more examples or examples with the purpose of streamlining the disclosure. It is to be understood that the above description is intended to be illustrative, and not restrictive. It is intended to cover all alternatives, modifications and equivalents of the different features and embodiments. Many other examples will be apparent to one skilled in the art upon reviewing the above specification. The embodiments were chosen and described in order to explain the principles of the disclosure and its practical applications, to thereby enable others skilled in the art to utilize the disclosure and various embodiments with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated.