Newswise — SEATTLE, November 30, 2021 -- While they decrease sound pollution, electric vehicles are so quiet, they can create a safety concern, particularly to the visually impaired. To address this, many governments have mandated artificial sounds be added to electric vehicles.
In the United States, regulations require vehicle sounds to be detectable at certain distances for various vehicle speeds, with faster speeds corresponding to larger detection distances. Michael Roan, from Penn State University, and Luke Neurauter, from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, and their team tested how well people detect electric vehicle sounds in terms of these requirements.
Roan will discuss their methods and results in the talk, "Electric Vehicle Additive Sounds: Detection results from an outdoor test for sixteen participants," on Tuesday, Nov. 30 at 1:25 p.m. Eastern U.S. at the Hyatt Regency Seattle. The presentation is part of the 181st Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, taking place Nov. 29-Dec. 3.
Participants in the study were seated adjacent to a lane of the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute's Smart Road facility and pressed a button upon hearing an approaching electric vehicle. This allowed the researchers to measure the probability of detection versus distance from the vehicle, a new criterion for evaluating safety compared to the mean detection distance.
"All of the cases had mean detection ranges that exceeded the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration minimum detection distances. However, there were cases where probability of detection, even at close ranges, never reached 100%," said Roan. "While the additive sounds greatly improve detection distances over the no sound condition, there are cases where pedestrians still missed detections."
Even after adding sound, electric vehicles are typically quieter than standard internal combustion engine vehicles. In urban environments, they would create less sound pollution.
Roan said further studies need to be done to investigate detection when all vehicles at an intersection are electric. Additive sounds could create a complex interference pattern that may result in some loud locations and other locations with very little sound.
###
----------------------- MORE MEETING INFORMATION -----------------------
USEFUL LINKS
Main meeting website: https://acousticalsociety.org/asa-meetings/
Technical program: https://eventpilotadmin.com/web/planner.php?id=ASAFALL21
Press Room: http://acoustics.org/world-wide-press-room/
Follow conference highlights with social media hashtag #ASA181
WORLDWIDE PRESS ROOM
In the coming weeks, ASA's Worldwide Press Room will be updated with additional tips on dozens of newsworthy stories and with lay language papers, which are 300-500 word summaries of presentations written by scientists for a general audience and accompanied by photos, audio, and video. You can visit the site during the meeting at http://acoustics.org/world-wide-press-room/.
PRESS REGISTRATION
We will grant free registration to credentialed journalists and professional freelance journalists. If you are a reporter and would like to attend, contact the AIP Media Line at 301-209-3090. For urgent requests, staff at [email protected] can also help with setting up interviews and obtaining images, sound clips or background information.
VIRTUAL MEDIA BRIEFINGS
Press briefings will be held virtually during the conference. Credentialed media can register in advance by emailing [email protected] and include your full name and affiliation in the message. The official schedule will be announced as soon as it is available and registered attendees will be provided login information via email.
ABOUT THE ACOUSTICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA
The Acoustical Society of America (ASA) is the premier international scientific society in acoustics devoted to the science and technology of sound. Its 7,000 members worldwide represent a broad spectrum of the study of acoustics. ASA publications include The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America (the world's leading journal on acoustics), Acoustics Today magazine, books, and standards on acoustics. The society also holds two major scientific meetings each year. For more information about ASA, visit our website at http://www.acousticalsociety.org.
###
RSS