WASHINGTON (Jan. 29, 2015) — The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is requesting comments on whether it should add two new brake safety technologies to its New Car Assessment Program (NCAP).
The NCAP is designed to provide comparative information on the safety of new vehicles to help consumers in choosing cars, NHTSA said in a Jan. 28 Federal Register notice.
The agency seeks to add two automatic emergency braking (AEB) technologies to its recommended list within the NCAP: crash imminent braking (CIB) and dynamic brake support (DBS).
CIB systems provide automatic braking when forward-looking sensors indicate a crash is imminent and the driver is not braking, NHTSA said. DBS systems provide supplemental braking when sensors determine that driver-supplied braking is insufficient to prevent a crash, it said.
CIB and DBS would join forward collision warning (FCW), lane departure warning (LDW) and rearview video systems (RVS) among the technologies NHTSA recommends in the NCAP. Electronic stability control (ESC) is no longer mentioned in the NCAP because it is now mandatory on all new light vehicles, NHTSA said.
The agency is accepting comments on the CIB-DSB proposal until March 30. The Federal Register notice may be found on its website.