Is 5G C-V2X really paving the road to autonomy?

At AutoTech Europe, TU-Automotive took a step back to look back at last year’s conference in which it was claimed that 5G C-V2X is paving the way for fully autonomous vehicles.

Key to the discussion is whether 5G as well as 5G C-V2X are sufficient for creating a fully autonomous vehicle future. Niels Peter Skov Andersen, chair of ETSI Intelligent Transport Systems Technical Committee of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), begins by saying V2X and C-V2X are basically the same things. ‘C-V2X’ is a term used by the telecommunications companies.

He adds: “What has to be understood is that we are operating with different forms of communication. We have short-range direct communication for communicating directly between vehicles and vehicles as well as directly between vehicles and road infrastructure. We would typically use that for tactical information, to communicate things drivers can see out of the window or around corners. It covers all of the things you need to do to avoid crashing.

“Then you have long-range communications where you can, for example, update the map which is not necessarily a fixed map but a dynamic map with roadworks and other road event updates,” he explains. C-V2X is a communications technology they propose for short and long-range communications, and he says there are more than 20.000 km of roads covered by ITS-G5 and believes it’s up to the industry to implement the standards.

ETSI standards

ETSI standards are based on ITS-G5, which he explains is a profiling of IEEE 802.11p – the Wi-Fi standard that is in all phones and laptops. They are being deployed in Europe at the moment and Volkswagen is one of the automakers involved with their deployments in conjunction with a number of road operators for common deployment profiling of the standards. He explains: “The C-V2X and ITS-G5 are the transmission layer. However, they are not compatible. For the upper layers, the applications, the ETSI standard is able to work over both of these.”

A new standard is also being developed too, which will act like a beacon signal that’s traditionally used on a plane or a ship. So, a signal could be sent out to warn other vehicles of a breakdown or an accident, or even of ice on the road. However, there is a key difference to planes in the sky. Congestion is much more significant on the ground as a result of the greater density of cars and other vehicles.

Density makes the situation more complex. Beacon signals nevertheless tell everyone else where you are and how you are moving. So, whenever an accident or breakdown occurs, and presents a danger to other road users, the road operator can use this information to take appropriate action.

Vulnerable road users

Then there is a second phase to consider, which is about vulnerable road users and permitting them to share information about themselves. “GPS or Galileo might not get sufficient location precision to know whether someone is on the pavement or in the street,” he explains before revealing there will be ‘collective perception’ later this year.

A report on the US National Library of Medicine’s website, Collective Perception: A Safety Perspective by Florian A. Schiegg et al, defines it as follows: “Collective perception allows stations (traffic participants and infrastructure) to inform connected stations of objects (such as pedestrians, obstacles, and other vehicles) detected by their object-tracking sensors.” Both vehicles and infrastructure use a number of sensors to detect other road users, such as pedestrians and share that information with others about what they see and perceive within their environment.

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