Politicians and automakers are hesitating: Autopilot could prevent millions of crashes

While Tesla is already putting its cars on the road with autonomous assistance systems, German manufacturers are hesitant. Politics is also moving at a snail's pace, says car expert Dudenhöffer. According to his analysis, the technology could prevent most accidents on German roads.

The number of traffic accidents in Germany could be dramatically reduced through the faster use of currently existing technology for autonomous driving. This is the result of an analysis by the auto expert Ferdinand Dudenhöffer from the Center for Automotive Research (Car) at the University of Duisburg-Essen. Dudenhöffer compares the frequency of accidents in German road traffic with the safety data published by the electric car manufacturer Tesla for its cars with various assistance systems in the USA.

In Germany, an average of 280,000 kilometers per car was driven last year. This number has been falling for a number of years, so the accident rate is increasing. According to the latest data from Tesla's Vehicle Safety Report, Tesla drivers with activated autopilot were statistically involved in an accident only every 7.4 million kilometers, Tesla drivers with an activated safety assistance system without autopilot every 3.9 million kilometers.

If these values ​​were transferred to German traffic, if all cars were equipped with an autopilot, the accident rate would decrease by around 90 percent. Instead of 2.6 million accidents as last year, there would then only be a good 280,000 accidents.

According to Dudenhöffer, such a decrease of almost 90 percent is a theoretical scenario. Because road traffic in the USA and Germany is not comparable, and the definition of accident in the statistics is different. If the automotive economist transfers the US figures to German conditions, there is still a possible decline of more than 60 percent due to widespread use of autopilots.

In view of this potential, Dudenhöffer is disappointed by the politicians, which are only moving at a snail's pace when it comes to the necessary legislation, and by the German carmakers who threaten to lose touch with fully automated driving. The established companies cut their investments because they considered the systems to be too expensive. Tesla, on the other hand, is further expanding its innovation lead. "That could be dangerous for the other premium providers in the car market."