UL officially releases new UL 4600 driverless safety assessment standard

Providing a basis for evaluating driverless products

On April 1, 2020, Underwriters Laboratories (UL), a nonprofit standards organization, announced the official release of UL 4600, the Safety Assessment Standard for Autonomous Driving Products - the first safety assessment standard developed by UL for driverless vehicles.

Paragraph 2: The scope of the standard includes safety principles and processes for evaluating autonomous driving products that do not require human driver supervision, meaning that the vehicle is fully autonomous. This standard is based on factors such as design process, testing, tool qualification, autonomy verification, data integrity, and human-machine interaction for non-drivers, covering several topics such as corresponding risk analysis and safety-related aspects, and requires safety demonstration. UL 4600 remains technology neutral, that is, it does not force the use of any specific technology in the development of autonomous driving systems and allows flexibility in the design process.

UL 4600 does not define safety performance nor does it define simple criteria for safety or unsafety, nor does it address road testing or acceptable levels of hazard. In addition, this standard does not address any ethical requirements related to product design release decisions or product performance.

UL worked with industry expert Dr. Philip Koopman to develop this standard. Dr. Koopman is an internationally recognized expert in the field of autonomous vehicle safety and brought more than 20 years of research experience to work with UL on this standard.

UL convened a large number of international stakeholders in various forms to participate in the Standards Technical Panel (STP) to jointly develop the document. Group members suggested candidate content, shared knowledge, reviewed and voted on the proposed content, and finally reached a consensus on the release of the first edition of UL 4600. Other stakeholders provided comments and suggestions through UL's online standard collaboration platform.

"We are grateful to Dr. Koopman and the many stakeholders who actively shared their knowledge and insights with us and contributed to the development of this standard," said Phil Piqueira, UL's vice president of global standards. "This event sets a great example of how standardization can keep pace with emerging industries, helping to support safety while encouraging innovation and continuous improvement."

“Uber ATG believes that voluntary industry standards that support the safe development and deployment of autonomous vehicles (SDVs) are important considerations for all companies involved in this space. UL’s new standards and standards development approach allow for rapid iteration and feedback to keep pace with our industry’s needs,” said Nat Beuse, head of safety at Uber ATG. “Uber and the rest of the STP are making it a priority to participate and contribute to the safety aspects of SDV development and to have these conversations and drive consensus around them.”

STP members represent a variety of stakeholders including autonomous driving technology experts, autonomous driving technology companies, vehicle manufacturers, trucking, robotics, aviation and government systems. International participation in the standard setting process is very strong, with participating members from the United States, China, Germany, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Singapore and other countries.

UL 4600 will continue to be evaluated to ensure that the content is relevant and to promote the reasonable adoption of opinions. People from all walks of life are welcome to submit supplementary and modification suggestions at any time through the website CSDS.UL.com .

After the official release of UL 4600, UL and related parties will continue to promote the standard to become the national standard of the United States and Canada, and continuously promote standard upgrades based on industry development to better adapt to the times, benefit customers, continuously innovate in the application of safety technology, and provide protection for public safety.

UL not only insists on continuous progress and innovation in the field of standards, but also focuses on improving its technical strength. In 2019, UL invested heavily to build the world's first UL laboratory designed specifically for the new energy vehicle industry in Changzhou. It is expected to be officially completed in 2020. The service content covers the entire industry chain, further expanding UL's professionalism and foresight in the automotive field, and contributing to the development of the world's automotive industry.