EU to Mandate Daytime Running Lights for New Vehicles
September 25, 2008 // Published as a news service by IHS
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To increase road safety, the European Commission (EC) plans to introduce dedicated daytime running lights (DRL) on all new types of motor vehicles in the European Union (EU) from the year 2011 onwards.
Dedicated daytime running lights are special lamps that are automatically switched on when the engine is started. They substantially increase the visibility of motor vehicles to other road users, and have a low energy consumption compared to existing dipped-beam head lamps.
The mandatory introduction of dedicated DRL was discussed in the EC's CARS 21 High Level Group report, "Competitive Automotive Regulatory System for the 21st Century," with high-level executives from EU member states, industry and non-governmental organizations and got unanimous approval.
In order to avoid divergent vehicle requirements, which would be detrimental to the needs of European citizens and European industry, the new decision is technically a proposal to align directive 76/756/EEC with UN/ECE Regulation No 48 (see IP/08/1061).
The new directive, which was adopted by the EC on Sept. 24, foresees that starting Feb. 7, 2011, all new types of passenger cars and small delivery vans will have to be equipped with DRL. Trucks and buses will follow 18 months later (August 2012).
According to available research, all road users, including pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, can detect, recognize and identify vehicles equipped with DRL, both better and earlier. In countries that have already made DRL obligatory, the experience in the field of road safety is very positive.
On vehicles equipped with daytime running lights, the light is automatically switched on when the engine is started. When it is dark, the driver has to switch on the driving lights manually. In this case, the DRL goes off automatically.
From an environmental point of view, dedicated daytime running lights are an effective solution to improve visibility and conspicuity of vehicles. As the technology is especially designed to be used during daytime, it is much more effective and efficient than existing lighting devices. The energy consumption is approximately only 25% to 30% of the energy consumption of normal driving lights. When using light-emitting diode technology for dedicated DRL, the energy consumption is reduced to only 10%.
Günter Verheugen, EC vice president responsible for enterprise and industry policy, said, "The introduction of daytime running light for cars, trucks and buses makes them more visible, which will increase road safety. This will make a positive contribution to our goal of reducing fatalities on European roads whilst being more fuel-efficient than existing lights."
For more information, see the EC web page on automotive safety.
Source: European Commission.