Assessment of noise and particle emissions of L category vehicles from real driving conditions

Topic description

ExpectedOutcome:

Project results are expected to contribute to the following outcomes:

• In-depth assessment of the noise and pollutant emissions of at least 150 L category vehicles, starting from the 10 top sellers of the different subcategories having significant sales (at least mopeds, 125cc, 250cc, 500 cc and above 500cc motorbikes, l6 and l7 microcars, light freight transport 3 and 4 wheelers), including different brands and geographical coverage. This will allow to take into account a large share of their environmental impact.
• Measures for mitigating the noise from L category vehicles.
• Development of reliable detection techniques for tampered L category vehicles.
• Best practices for integrating a growing number of L category vehicles in the urban traffic without increasing the noise and emission pollution.

Noise pollution is a growing environmental concern and has been affecting quality of life and well-being. It is caused by a varied number of sources and is widely present not only in the busiest urban environments, it is also pervading once natural environments. The adverse effects affect the well-being of exposed human populations, in the health and distribution of wildlife, in the abilities of our children to learn properly at school and in the high economic price society must pay because of noise pollution. Health effects, for instance, can be as bad as increasing the risk of hypertension and cardiovascular disease.

Whilst the increase in traffic volume results in higher noise levels, the increase in urbanisation results in a higher number of people affected by noise. As a result, the adverse health impacts, both direct and indirect, of traffic noise are expected to increase in the future despite potential noise-reducing improvements in vehicles, tyres and roads.

One of the ways of reducing noise from road (or rail) traffic is by tackling the problem at source. Setting lower emission limits via regulation is doubtless effective if it is based upon an appropriate test methodology, and good results have been achieved on large vehicles. However L category vehicles are often perceived as a significant contributors to noise pollution and this might be due to the fact that noise emissions seem to be strictly optimised for specific conditions (but also due to tampering by their users, which in some cases is made too easy by the way the vehicles are built). Moreover, recent measurement campaigns in EU funded projects found some motorbikes having extremely high nanoparticles emissions. Real driving portable emissions measurement system (PEMS) tests will also allow to verify if there are issues in emissions testing, while lab tests should assess the risks posed by particle emissions down to 2.5nm. Tampering is also often performed in order to increase performance, leading to higher emissions.

There proposals should address the following:

• Assess the behaviour of a large sample of these L vehicles in real driving conditions for both noise and emissions in comparison with certification tests (complemented where necessary by lab tests, since mini-PEMS cannot measure certain pollutants like particles, ammonia and hydrocarbons).
• In particular, assess the real world driving behaviour that can produce particularly high annoyance and effect on health (noise emissions).
• Propose specific technical improvements in the standard test procedure (performed in homologated test tracks) so that the tests could better approach real world driving conditions and improve measurement technology for detecting nanoparticles.
• Assess how significant the impact of these emissions is on urban environments and health and examine whether the current regulatory limits are sufficient.
• Assess how widespread tampering is, its impact on global urban noise and emissions lev, its impact on global urban noise and emissions levels, and propose solutions to prevent it.
• Develop reliable technological solutions and effective experimental techniques for better enforcement of the regulatory measures for detecting noise under real driving conditions

This action will be focussed in particular in cities and regions with high powered two wheelers use and the derived knowledge will provide significant support to designing future measures aimed at reducing the noise and pollution emission levels from these vehicles.

Projects should make use of available results and technologies from projects funded in projects on remote monitoring issuing from topics LC-MG-1-1-2018 and LC-MG-1-9-2019, from projects on tampering LC-MG-1-4-2018, and from projects on nanoparticles measurement issuing from topic GV-02-2016.

Selected projects under this topic are strongly encouraged to participate in joint activities as appropriate.^[1]

In line with the Union’s strategy for international cooperation in research and innovation, international cooperation is encouraged.

Activities are expected to achieve TRL 5-6 by the end of the project – see General Annex B.

International Cooperation

[1]These joint activities could, for example, take the form of clustering of projects and involve joint coordination and dissemination activities such as the participation in joint workshops, the exchange of knowledge, or the development and adoption of best practices. Successful proposals will also be encouraged to exchange with other relevant proposals funded under other topics and other clusters to ensure synergies on cross-cutting challenges of common interest. Therefore, proposals are expected to include a budget to cover those joint coordination and dissemination activities without the prerequisite to define concrete joint activities at this stage. The details of these joint activities will be defined during the grant preparation phase with the Commission.