Assessing environmental impact of vehicle transit

Abstract

The environmental impact of vehicle transit through an area is often evaluated through indirect and / or aggregate metrics, such as visibility and / or health effects from smog, or the contamination of air or water quality. However, such environmental metrics may be inaccurate, incomplete, delayed, and / or insufficient to inform a user of a vehicle as to the environmental impact of the vehicle transit of his or her vehicle on the environment. Instead, a vehicle device may collect driving metrics for a vehicle, and may transmit such driving metrics to an environmental monitoring service, which may correlate such driving metrics for the vehicle with the environmental impact. A notification of environmental impact may be transmitted back to the vehicle device, which may present the environmental impact to the user, and / or may adjust an autonomous operation of the vehicle, such as a speed or route of the vehicle, in view of the environmental impact.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]The present application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e) to U.S. Patent Application No. 61 / 946,962, filed on Mar. 3, 2014, the entirety of which is incorporated by reference as if fully rewritten herein.BACKGROUND[0002]Within the field of computing, many scenarios involve an evaluation of an environmental impact of vehicle transit on an environment, such as the pollution and / or health impacts caused on a residential neighborhood by a recurring volume of vehicle transit. Such evaluation is often performed by measuring the consequences of such vehicle transit, e.g., measurements of levels of contaminants in the air and water of the environment, or measurements of the health of the residents of the neighborhood. The evaluation of the environmental effects may be generated for the environment and reported to the public, including the residents of the environment, the individuals operating and / or occupying such vehicles in transit throu...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The patent describes techniques for assessing the environmental impact of vehicle transit in an area and informing users about it. This can be useful for policy decisions and promoting sustainable transportation. The techniques involve receiving data from vehicles, evaluating it to determine the impact of the vehicle on the environment, and notifying users about it. This can help individuals make informed decisions and promote sustainable transportation.

Problems solved by technology

Together, such environmental impacts 110 may harm the health and numbers of individuals, animals, and plants in the areas 106; may degrade the aesthetic appearance and value of the areas 102; and / or may interfere with or prohibit some uses of the areas 102, such as contaminating farmland in a manner that is not compatible with growing edible crops.

However, in many respects, such techniques may not adequately inform such users 108 about the direct consequences of their actions and choices on the overall environmental quality on various areas 102 of the environment.

For example, many forms of pollution 112 may accumulate slowly over time, and may not be assessed or even noticed until crossing a visibility threshold, by which time the consequences may already have manifested and remediation may be costly.

As a second such example, the evaluation of the environmental impact 110 of vehicle transit through an assessment of indirect factors, such as pollution levels over time, may be inaccurate and / or unreliable.

As a fourth such example, the complexity of such data may cause users 108 to develop incorrect conclusions about their contribution to the aggregate environmental impact.

Indeed, the users' choices may instill a false sense of environmental responsibility, and an entire population of the region that strives to make responsible choices may be surprised by the severe aggregate environmental impact 110 on the region due to the inaccuracy of their self-assessment.

However, it may be difficult for the transit service 116 to do so if information about the environmental impact 110 of such driving metrics 106 is only available in the aggregate.

Images