Driverless Road Cleaning Vehicles Now a Reality

Driverless road cleaning vehicles are now a reality as two consortia in Singapore have undertaken the design, development and trial. The first consortia comprising of Nanyang Technological University, Enway, Veolia ES Singapore Industrial and Wong Fong Engineering Works; and the second consortia is made up of ST Engineering Land Systems and 800 Super Waste Management. The National Environment Agency (NEA) and the Ministry of Transport (MOT) awarded the two consortia with research and development projects.

They will develop and trial one 'autonomous environmental service vehicle' (AESV) each, and apply autonomous vehicle (AV) technology to commercial mechanical road sweepers. According to a joint statement, this will be carried out over a period of 18 months, including a one-year development phase and a proof-of-concept (POC) trial over six months. The trials are expected to begin in 2020 and will be conducted in two stages, with each consortia required to test and demonstrate the safety features of their AESV units within the enclosed circuit.

The consortia will only be allowed to commence trials on public roads at designated AV test sites such as one-north. Then they will have to go through a rigorous safety assessment.