DRIVING a forty-ton truck and trailer on the motorway south of Stockholm, the driver keeps a close eye on the road, but, surprisingly, has no hands on the wheel. Instead, the truck drives itself, and veteran driver Roger Nordqvist remains on standby only in case of unexpected problems.

Swedish truck manufacturer Scania is not the only carmaker developing autonomous vehicles, but it recently became the first in Europe to use them for delivering commercial goods.

The truck has built-in cameras and sensors on the roof

“We pick up goods and transport them from point A to point B, completely autonomously,” Peter Hafmar, head of autonomous solutions at Scania, told AFP at the transport department in Sodertalje, south of Stockholm.

In the pilot project, the self-driving truck maneuvers along a stretch of approximately 300 kilometers between Sodertalje and Jonkoping in southern Sweden, delivering fast food. From the outside, the vehicle looks almost like any other truck, but it has built-in cameras and two sensors on the roof.

In the cab, the steering wheel and seats are where you would expect them to be, but the dashboard is full of numerous devices and screens, and a multitude of wires leads to a computer rack located behind the passenger seat.

“It drives better on its own”

Engineer Goran Fjallid sits next to the driver in the passenger seat, his eyes fixed on a laptop receiving video footage from the truck’s cameras and monitoring flickering text with information.

Another screen shows a 3D visualization of the truck on the road and all nearby vehicles. The truck combines all the data from different sensors with the GPS system, with the different technologies acting as backups for one another.

“If the road markings disappear for a while, GPS is used and the truck stays in its lane,” Fjallid explained, adding that it drives better on its own than when you operate it manually.

He admits that there was a lot of trial and error to get the truck to its current state. Things had to be adjusted, such as how the truck merges into motorway traffic and what to do when another car cuts in front of it.

There are still obstacles that need to be resolved

Every time the truck does something unexpected, for example brakes or slows down for no visible reason, Fjallid records the exact moment it happened so that the logs and data can be reviewed later. The truck’s sensors are also calibrated daily before it goes out on the road.

Hafmar says there are still obstacles that need to be resolved before driverless trucks become a common sight on the roads, both in terms of technology and legislation. This is expected to be resolved by the end of the 2020s or the beginning of the 2030s, Hafmar says.

What will happen to truck drivers?

The emergence of self-driving trucks can be seen as a threat to the jobs of truck drivers, one of the most common occupations in the world. But Hafmar believes autonomous vehicles are needed to solve the global driver shortage.

He says it will still be a long time before artificial intelligence is able to handle all aspects of logistics. He explains that at first autonomous trucks will probably be used for long journeys, but the final kilometers to the store and the customer will still be handled by people.

According to a report by the International Road Transport Union (IRU) from June, there were around 2.6 million unfilled truck driver positions worldwide last year.

Numerous companies want self-driving trucks

Hafmar also points out other potential advantages: since computers do not need to rest or sleep, vehicles can travel when traffic is lighter or drive more slowly but for longer in order to save fuel.

Numerous companies are in the race to launch self-driving trucks. Startups Aurora, Waymo, Embark, Kodiak and Torc (together with Daimler) are conducting tests in the United States, while China’s Baidu announced a self-driving truck at the end of 2021.

In Europe, Iveco is cooperating on this work with California startup Plus with Amazon’s support. Swedish company Einride is also planning to launch tests on German roads soon.

Source: index.hr