IBM Wants Motor Control
Saturday, 22 May 2010 13:10 | Author: TommyRay | 
IBM wants to stop and start your cars engine at lengthy traffic lights in order to improve fuel consumption, according to a pending patent. This is no easily managed feat, as a simple off and on signal isn't all they'd like to utilize in thier green-idea. They also want position data so the system knows where the vehicles are. Why? To create a 'queue' with which to even further optimize fuel-savings by timing each ignition as needed.
And it isn't just traffic lights. Railroad crossings are also a big contributer to fuel wasting consumption by waiting vehicles. But this also raises other concerns and questions, as does any complex, new technologies will. What if it's 120 degrees and you're sweltering? What if your engine doesn't start right up? Is this automation fully controlling the ignition, or will the driver have the option to be signaled when to stop and start the engine?
Personally, I'm not sure if this obviously expensive idea is going to save all that much in fuel or environment. And being a more rural-dwelling person, I'm not in many gridlock type situations, though I have sat for a lengthy locomotive on more rare than often occasions. So I am more aware of things such as sitting at a traffic light with NO traffic at all. What's with THAT? Why, in this age, am I being forced to wait and waste fuel, for no reason other than avoiding a ticket, at a traffic light where there's noone else but me?
Where are the "Smart-Lights" I'd dreamed of for years? You know, lights that allow traffic flow continously when opposing traffic is nill? I'll bet you that this would save ALOT more in fuel and environment overall nation-wide than several areas in big-city situations. Not to mention extending the life of brakes, too.
Source: Slashdot
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