DAIMLER TECHNICITY 01-2011 English by Mercedes-Benz next

MAGAZINE FOR INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

ISSUE 01 2011

TECHNICITY MAGAZINE FOR INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

TECHNICITY

ALWAYS ON The networked world now extends to individual mobility — and opens up previously undreamed-of possibilities. TECHNICITY

A Daimler AG publication © Stuttgart 2011

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FOR ISSN 2190-0523

PHOTO: FRANK KAYSER PHOTOGRAPHY

MAGAZINE

URBAN COMPETITION

HIGH-PERFORMANCE ENGINES

How major cities in the EU are evolving thanks to new concepts for sustainability and mobility.

How boosting efﬁciency to the maximum leads to top engine performance.

CAR-TO-X COMMUNICATION

FITNESS MANAGEMENT

Why communication between vehicles will transform the future of mobility.

How innovative technologies help athletes and truck drivers improve their performance.

INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

ISSUE 01 2011

6.50 9.00 10.00 6.00 60.50

EUR USD CHF GBP CNY

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TECHNICITY <Eng.> n; -ies (abbr. T) 1. Noun composed of the words tech•nol•o•gy (1) and cit•y (2) 2. The name of a magazine that describes the use of (1) in urban environments and metropolitan areas worldwide 3. <Eng.> for the German Tech•ni•zi•tät (3) 4. The technical nature of an in•no•va•tion (4)

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INTERNET ON BOARD The display of the COMAND Online integrated unit from Mercedes-Benz.

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NETWORKED VEHICLE Cars such as this one in New York can communicate online in real time to optimize their travel routes.

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The World Wide Web is rapidly changing the world — and opening up previously undreamed-of possibilities. That’s why we’re devoting this issue of TECHNICITY to digital networks and the potential applications they offer for individual users, technology, and society at large. There are big opportunities here — but also some risks. The number of electronic control units in automobiles has been steadily increasing for years now. Today there are between 40 and 50 tiny high-performance computers in every S-Class or E-Class vehicle from Mercedes-Benz. Our new telematics generation is now integrating the Internet into vehicles. We’re ALWAYS ON (p. 50) — and that also applies to individual mobility. For 125 years now, we’ve been closely involved with the latest trends and developments in the automotive field — and we will continue to play a leading role in shaping mobility in the future. The virtual world is therefore an essential element of vehicle development at Daimler. The most recent example is our new DRIVING SIMULATOR (p. 10). It can simulate highly dynamic driving maneuvers much more realistically than has been possible before. As a result, the behavior of drivers and vehicles in road traffic can now be researched in even greater depth — and the results flow directly into the development of our series products to the benefit of our customers. At Daimler Trucks, our commercial vehicle developers have taken a very close look at the condition and fitness of drivers in our TOPFIT TRUCK technology platform (p. 26). State-of-the-art technologies are helping practitioners of extreme sports and truck drivers alike to pace themselves, exploit their full performance range, and be in top form when they arrive at their destination. Powerful HIGH-PERFORMANCE ENGINES (p. 38) are also delivering top efficiency. The engineers at AMG recently provided an impressive demonstration of this with the new V8 engine known as the M 157. The drive system’s fuel consumption figures not only undercut all of its direct competitors but also make it more fuel-efficient than much less powerful engines. Pleasant reading! Thomas Weber Member of the Board of Management of Daimler AG, responsible for Group Research & Mercedes-Benz Cars Development

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High-performance engines

Fitness management

84 Urban competition

10 Simulating extremes

ALWAYS ON The networked world now extends to individual mobility — and is opening up previously undreamedof possibilities for individuals, technology, and society at large. TECHNICITY author Steffan HEUER explains the networking models of the online technologies. 1. Body Area Network The digital networking of the human body. 2. Wide Area Network Household and vehicle become an interface. 3. Metropolitan Network Complex online services are used in cities. 4. Global Area Network The unlimited networking of cities and regions. 5. Society Network A potentially vicious cycle: The opportunities and risks of life without an “off switch.”

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INDEX

TECHNOLOGY

TALENT

TOLERANCE

New technologies are the indispensable driver of innovations and progress in the 21st century — they’re exciting, electrifying, and fascinating.

“Winning the competition to attract talented employees is the key to business success,” says the U.S. economist Richard FLORIDA. In the innovation regions, creative people are deﬁning the future.

Tolerance, openness, and cultural diversity are crucial to economic growth in large cities — and the expression of a new urban lifestyle.

Simulating extremes The most powerful driving simulator in Europe is located in Sindelfingen, Germany. The high-tech trials that are conducted here test the safety technologies of the vehicles of tomorrow in virtual extreme situations.

ALWAYS ON

Car-to-x communication In a large-scale pilot project in Germany, a consortium representing the business, scientiﬁc, and political spheres is testing car-to-x communication. It will mark a crucial change in the future of mobility.

20 SPECTRUM High-tech news from the innovation regions around the world.

Digital networks The networked world now extends to individual mobility. This is creating opportunities — but risks as well. We are “always on” — at home, in the car, and in a larger sense at the local and global levels as well. Will we still be able to “switch off”?

62 26 Fitness management Athletes and truck drivers are endurance professionals. In the TopFit Truck Challenge, Ironman triathlete Lothar Leder and professional Daimler ﬂeet driver Armin Weinmann show how top performance is supported by state-of-the-art technologies.

38 High-performance engines The classic internal combustion engine is still capable of more. That is being impressively demonstrated by the outstanding engineering of the M 157 engine in the new Mercedes AMG.

METROPOLIS From the city to the pool of ideas: the most exciting innovations from Shenzhen (China), Kawasaki (Japan), Vancouver (Canada), and Mexico City (Mexico).

66 TRANSFER Masdar City Jürgen HÄPP is a project manager at the British star architects Foster + Partners, where he is working on the pioneering urban project Masdar City in Abu Dhabi. TECHNICITY talked to this talented architect about the unique opportunity to design new urban structures with state-of-the-art mobility solutions from the ground up.

78 Concept A-Class Behind the title “Concept A-Class” is a completely new vehicle concept from Mercedes-Benz. TECHNICITY provides an exclusive report about the highly secretive development process.

84 Urban competition The “European Green Capital Award” is presented to major cities that are implementing especially sustainable urban development projects and intelligent mobility concepts. In this issue we take a look at three of the most innovative major cities: Hamburg (Germany), Nantes (France), and Barcelona (Spain).

96 DIGITAL

ANALOGY Urban vs. maritime mobility: The smart escooter meets the Super Falcon submersible.

IMPRINT AND CONTACT

98 PROJECTOR

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A Daimler Brand

Sun on. Sun off. Sun on. Sun off. The new SLK. /PX XJUI B XPSME GJSTU ."(*$ 4,: $0/530- UIF JOOPWBUJWF HMBTT SPPG XJUI USBOTQBSFODZ BU UIF UPVDI PG B CVUUPO :PVS DMPTFTU SFMBUJPOTIJQ XJUI UIF SPBE www.mercedes-benz.com

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INNOVATION, TECHNOLOGY <Eng.> n; -s, -ies (abbr. I, T) “If there is a secret behind successful INNOVATION (see p. 38, “M 157”), it lies in the relentless attempts to answer the question ‘Which is the BEST (see p. 10, “Driving simulator”)?’ It lies in the interplay of CONTRASTS (see p. 26 “Top Fit”), of supply and demand, of light and dark, of the lark and the nightingale, of the bull and the bear.” Hans BLANK (*1933), German corporate consultant, former head of Human Resources Development, Thyssen Niederrhein AG, Oberhausen.

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TEXT Martin SCHÄFER

PHOTOGRAPHY Stefan HOHLOCH

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PARAMETERS NAME: Driving Simulator Hall FOUNDED IN: 2010 EMPLOYEES: 20 TESTS: approx. 1,000 test drive simulations annually LOCATION: Werkshalle 64, Mercedes-Benz plant in Sindelﬁngen, Germany

Hamburg

Berlin

Cologne Frankfurt

Stuttgart SINDELFINGEN

REALITY AND SIMULATION A newly developed assistance or safety system for the next model series can be thoroughly tested in the driving simulator before it’s allowed to hit the streets. Volunteer test drivers and professional test and development drivers make hundreds of test drives every year. The researchers hope this process will ensure shorter development times and provide insights into their customers’ driving behavior. Sometimes simulation is superior to reality: Certain driving simulations, such as potential accident situations, can be carried out by volunteers only in a simulator. Nonetheless, every simulation is followed by a practical test on a real road.

NIGHT DRIVE In the world’s most advanced driving simulator, driving skills and systems are pushed to their limits.

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MACROSCOPE FLOATING TECHNOLOGY FOR THE SIMULATOR CABIN The simulator cabin (dome) and the six-armed movement mechanism (hexapod) weigh 22 tonnes and rest on an air bearing that is as thin as a human hair. The surfaces of the air bearing have small holes that distribute the stream of air via tiny laser-cut channels. Because the air thus presses on a broad surface, the nine bars of air pressure from the production plant are completely sufficient to lift these 22 tonnes. Magnets pull the base of the hexapod along the crossrail, which is 12.5 meters long. This enables accelerations up to 1 g â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the acceleration due to gravity â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and a maximum speed of 36 km/h. The six telescopic arms of the hexapod are powered by electrical spindle drive systems. In this way the researchers achieve a higher degree of rigidity for the overall system than they could with pneumatic or hydraulic drive systems. The driving simulator is also breaking new ground in terms of the kinds of vibrations it can generate: Vibrations at frequencies of up to 10 hertz can be created, making the simulation of driving over cobblestones possible.

DOME IN THE DARK Accelerations of up to 1 g (the acceleration due to gravity) can be achieved with the hexapod of the simulator cabin.

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CONTROL ROOM Eye to eye with the driverâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cabin, technicians supervise the testing in the driving simulator hall on about two dozen displays.

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PERFECT ILLUSION Eight projectors create a photorealistic 360-degree image on the inside wall of the simulatorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s dome.

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MACROSCOPE

DRIVING SCENARIOS With the new driving simulator, the researchers can test almost any kind of driving scenario: emergency braking, evasive maneuvering, passing another vehicle, changing lanes, stop-and-go traffic. The only process that has not yet been successfully duplicated is the acceleration of a Mercedes-Benz SLK from 0 to 100 kilometers per hour in eight seconds. And there’s also a limit to hairpin curves, as the hexapods can only turn the simulator cabin by about 30 degrees. The researchers use the imaging system to simulate different angles of sunlight, as well as various weather conditions, such as rain, fog, and snow. However, they can’t reproduce the effect of rain on the windshield — they’ve left some room for the driver’s imagination. VIRTUAL LANDSCAPES The researchers can put together the route for the test drive using individual blocks, just like a puzzle. The developers included several dozen standard blocks in the program, including urban layouts, country roads, stretches of highway, and night scenes. The blocks measure 4.5 kilometers by 4.5 kilometers. They fit together at their edges, and generally show imaginary landscapes. However, these landscapes are represented very realistically, with shadows passing over the car as it drives along past trees and pedestrians. On the road, test drivers encounter vehicles of every kind, ranging from bicycles to trucks.

SPEED LIMIT 36 KM/H The movements of the dome are coordinated down to the millisecond with the images in the interior.

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COMPUTER CLUSTER Future generations of vehicle systems are first fed into the simulator as digital prototypes and thoroughly tested.

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VIRTUAL EXTREME CONDITIONS AT THE MOST ADVANCED DRIVING SIMULATOR WORLDWIDE

riving a car at night is fairly challenging and exhausting. You’ve always got to drive behind the vehicle in front at the appropriate distance, taking note of brake lights and stray reflections and constantly evaluating all of them. Your eyes have to adjust to constantly changing light intensities, and rain might make a country road hard to see. Look out! The driver of the Mercedes-Benz C-Class slams on the brakes, automatically swerves to avoid a bike rider, and ends up in the opposite lane. His body presses against the safety belt and his hands lock on the steering wheel. The next adrenaline rush begins as the oncoming traffic temporarily blinds him and forces him to immediately return to his own lane. Now that the emergency is past, the driver can slowly “come down.” And suddenly the scene freezes, nothing is in motion, and the space is brightly illuminated: A night drive in the world’s most advanced high-performance driving simulator has concluded. “We can recreate and simulate almost every driving situation here with nearly perfect accuracy,” explains Eberhard Zeeb, the head of driving simulator research at Daimler in Sindelfingen. That includes the double lane change — from one lane to the other, and then back — the night, oncoming traffic, and background noise. Eight projectors create a 360-degree image on the inside wall of the simulator’s dome. In here there’s enough room for Daimler’s entire model lineup, from the smart to the Mercedes-Benz E-Class and the Mercedes-Benz Actros truck cab. The only compromise the engineers have to make is in terms of weather effects. “We can simulate imagery of different angles of sunlight, rain, fog, or snow,” Zeeb explains. “But there aren’t any real raindrops on the windshield.” The researchers aren’t trying to be movie directors. They have two main objectives. For one thing, test drivers in the simulator can experience the full spectrum of a model’s handling properties. For this the engineers mount the body of a Mercedes-Benz C-Class or a Mercedes-Benz Actros in the dome, wire the control systems — and let the drivers from the development units “hit the highway.” Outside the dome, the scene looks like this: The dome, installed in a capacious hall, dances on six legs — a “hexapod” — and a 12.5-meter-long crossrail. The test driver tries out the emergency braking procedure: The dome, along with the hexapod, dips in front and swerves sharply. The driver has to change lanes: Within seconds, the simulator dome moves briskly to the right along the rail. The fine-tuning of the traffic simulation imagery inside the dome and the overall motion during all this is accurate down to the millisecond. It’s the only way to provide the driver with the impression of a driving experience that is almost exactly like the real thing. And it’s also the only way for the researchers to recreate the real-life situation and study the driver’s reaction in extreme situations. This study serves the second research objective, which is to find out how the average driver deals with the vehicle’s technology and the assistance systems, and how the engineers can turn their development ideas into clear practical benefits for the customer. To do this, Zeeb puts the “man or woman in the street” into the simulator.

The questions he seeks to answer include: How does the test driver react when a tire goes flat? How can the engineers make the driver’s experience even more comfortable? Existing vehicle systems can be improved with the help of test subjects, and future systems can be tested to determine their true benefits. The 100th test subject will soon have been in the Daimler simulator, which cost €25 million. Is all the work and expense paying off? “In the simulator you can push the vehicle to its limits, something you would not want to attempt on real roads,” Zeeb says. “What’s more, the simulation enables us to move a vehicle to further development phases with a greater degree of maturity.” That saves money and boosts the reliability of the test results, he explains. That’s why the developers are lining up for a chance to conduct testing in the dome — and it also allows them to use a computer to first digitally create the next model generations. Zeeb’s team then feeds these digital prototypes into the simulator. The test driver will then be driving in the chassis of an existing production series, but the full range of the vehicle’s handling characteristics will match that of the next model generation, or the one after that. Zeeb says the developers must, and can, realize this level of abstraction. “We’ve already been driving in the Mercedes-Benz Actros cab, with the suspension tuning of the Mercedes-Benz SLK sports car,” he adds with a laugh.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article:

daimler-technicity.com/en/driving-simulator including the following features: • PHOTO GALLERY Night drive in the dome: An extensive photo gallery of the driving simulation hall in Sindelﬁngen • VIDEO Welcome to virtual worlds: The driving simulator from Mercedes-Benz • BACKGROUND (1) The IT for the simulator: PCs for projectors, hexapod, and side mirrors (2) “Seasick” in the simulator: What test subjects experienced • INTERVIEW “Digital test drives already during the early development phase” An interview with Eberhard ZEEB, the head of the Driving Simulators unit at Daimler

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SPECTRUM NANO-BUBBLES PURIFY WATER (KYOTO, Japan) Extremely fine bubbles with a diameter of less than a nanometer are capable of destroying particles suspended in water in a process that results in extreme purification. The solar-powered machine used to produce these tiny bubbles (which are invisible to the naked eye) was developed by the College of Life Sciences at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, Japan, and the Nishiken Devise company. The nano-bubbles supply microorganisms in river bed and ocean floor sludge with enough oxygen to do what they do best: organically decompose sludge. kippo.or.jp

TOKYO, Japan SEOUL, South Korea

KYOTO, Japan TAIPEI, Taiwan

SINGAPORE, Singapore

ASIA HIGH-TECH NEWS FROM AN INNOVATIVE REGION “A strong indication of changed consumer behavior with regard to computer hardware is provided by the fact that 300 million Chinese now use their cell phones to access the Internet.” Martin FRITZ, TECHNICITY correspondent, Tokyo

TINY COMPONENTS FOR SMARTPHONES (TOKYO, Japan) Japan’s TDK Corporation has discovered a way to reduce the size of electronic smartphone components by one-third. The new modules are built by directly connecting chips with circuit boards. To produce them, TDK is utilizing its expertise in manufacturing tiny reading heads for computer hard drives, a ﬁeld in which the company — which originally made its name with cassette tapes — is the world market leader. A prototype for a current comparator measures only 2.9 × 2.3 millimeters and is only 0.3 millimeters thick. Mass production of the mini-components will begin in the summer of 2011. e.nikkei.com ELECTRONICS The size of new modules for smartphones will be reduced by one-third.

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“NATURAL” SURFACES (SINGAPORE, Singapore) The Industrial Consortium on Nanoimprint in Singapore is cooperating with ﬁve companies in the U.S., Europe, and Japan on the development of new surface materials based on the natural solutions employed by marine organisms. The objective of this work is to develop anti-microbial surfaces that can be used for ship hulls, medical devices, and optical lenses. Such surfaces need to be completely smooth and clean in order to save energy and function optimally. a-star.edu.sg

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PERSPECTIVE Martin FRITZ Asia correspondent and author who has been working in Tokyo for the

POCKET-SIZED A fuel cell that requires nothing other than water.

PORTABLE FUEL CELL (KYOTO, Japan) In Kyoto, the startup company Aquafairy has begun to market a small, extremely lightweight fuel cell that can generate more than 2.5 watts. The fuel cell, which requires nothing other than water, can provide enough energy to power an iPhone battery for 90 minutes. Weighing only 128 grams, the pocket-size device uses calcium hydrate as a source of hydrogen. This substance, which is solid at room temperature, produces hydrogen when water is added. By interacting with oxygen in the cell, the hydrogen generates electricity.

WORLD’S SMALLEST MEMORY CHIP DEVELOPED (TAIPEI, Taiwan) Taiwan’s National Applied Research Laboratories have developed the world’s smallest memory chip. The “RRAM”, as the chip is known, contains structures that are nine nanometers thin and can store 20 times more information than the ﬂash memory cards currently used in cameras and cell phones. The “R” in the chip’s name stands for “repetitive” — as opposed to the DRAM (“D” for “dynamic”) designation used for chips currently on the market. The RRAMs need only 0.005% of the electricity used by today’s chips. The new technology is scheduled for market launch in ﬁve to ten years, at which time the chips will be able to store 500 gigabytes of data on an area of one square centimeter. It will also be possible to expand this memory capacity to 1.5 terabytes. taiwantoday.tw

asiacleantechgateway.com

SUPER TRANSISTORS Electrons change their spin direction — without requiring current.

TRANSISTORS THAT NEED NO ELECTRICITY (TOKYO, Japan) An international team of researchers has developed a transistor prototype that requires no electric current to generate standard ON and OFF signals. This breakthrough could result in the production of electronic devices that require only very little electricity. Instead of exploiting the ﬂow of electrical charge, the prototype utilizes change in electron spin direction as information that it then passes on. The researchers are working at the Hitachi Cambridge Laboratory, the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, and the Universities of Cambridge, Nottingham, and Texas.

German broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR Info) since 2001.

SMART WORLD One of the most important revolutions of the new decade involves the dwindling importance of personal computers. According to market researchers, there will be more smartphones than desktop PCs in operation around the globe by as early as 2013. This calculation doesn’t even include the expected 150 million tablet computers that will also be in use at that time. And while the PC is by no means in danger of extinction, most people on the planet may be taking care of computer tasks with mobile devices by as early as the middle of this decade. A strong indication of changed consumer behavior with regard to computer hardware is provided by the fact that 300 million Chinese now use their cell phones to access the Internet. The main reason for the triumphal march of the smartphone involves the dramatic increase of its computing capacity, graphical display capabilities, and touchscreen reaction times. Apple’s first iPhone still used standard electronics that anyone could manufacture — but a total of 30 percent of the components of the iPhone 4 now come from Japan, for the simple reason that companies in that country have the greatest expertise in building extremely small capacitors, inductors, and circuits. Extreme miniaturization has transformed smartphones into true all-rounders that can be used to make calls, send e-mails, browse the Internet, take pictures, make movies, listen to music, and even watch TV — all in high quality. When equipped with GPS receivers, they can also replace navigation devices. Also not to be forgotten is the veritable explosion of software creativity that has provided us with innumerable everyday helpers in the form of apps. As a result, data and programs that used to be reserved exclusively for PCs now land on a virtual desk in a computing cloud that can be accessed from almost anywhere. All of this is very much in line with our growing need to remain mobile even as we stay in contact with the workplace, friends, and family. Nothing satisfies this desire better than a smartphone in our pocket — a device truly befitting its name.

imre.a-star.edu.sg/nil

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SPECTRUM ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY TAPE (CORVALLIS, U.S.) Companies that manufacture labels for packages, sticky notes, tape, or self-adhesive postage stamps today have to use adhesives made from petroleum derivatives. Wood scientist Kaichang Li from Oregon State University accidentally discovered a green alternative for such applications while trying to develop a binding agent for wood laminates. Li’s new adhesive can be made with a whole range of oils from crops such as soybeans, corn, and rapeseed, and can be used with any application that requires pressure-sensitive adhesives. The new material is not only environmentally friendly; it also costs half as much as conventional adhesives, according to the university. Li is well versed in adhesives: Back in 2007, he received the Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award for his discovery of another environmentally friendly adhesive that takes its cue from nature. The chemical compound in question is used by mussels to securely hold on to rocks even in surging waves. cof.orst.edu

VANCOUVER, Canada

CORVALLIS, U.S. CAMBRIDGE, U.S.

WASHINGTON, U.S.

NORTH AMERICA HIGH-TECH NEWS FROM AN INNOVATIVE REGION “Reality and the Internet are coalescing into an endless playground. The video-based, intelligent charting and mapping of everyday activities is helping consumers and companies all over the U.S.” Steffan HEUER, TECHNICITY correspondent, San Francisco

DNA ARCHIVE Users will be able to enter and store their own DNA

GENOTYPES ON THE CHEAP (CAMBRIDGE, U.S.) Determining the sequence of the human genetic code cost around $3 billion and required a decade of work during the most intensive phase of the Human Genome Project. Today the same operation can be done in just a few days for only $20,000. This may be affordable for clinical labs and hospitals, but it’s still too expensive for individual patients and curious lay users. GnuBio — a company spun off from Harvard University — now plans to make genomics a mass-market industry and decode individual genomes in a few hours for only $30. The secret behind this cheap “gene reading” is an open database into which any user can automatically enter his or her DNA snippets anonymously in a process that results in a continually expanding archive. This will facilitate and accelerate the search for genetic disease markers and — more importantly — potential new treatments. gnubio.com

data in the future.

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PERSPECTIVE Steﬀan HEUER

GPS SKI GOGGLES FOR NETWORKED SNOWBOARDERS (VANCOUVER, Canada) Those who don’t want to miss out on any important information while on the slopes should go with the new GPS ski goggles from Recon Instruments in Vancouver. The “Transcend” model measures speed, route, and temperature, and also displays a stopwatch, the distance skied, and altitude on a small LCD screen at the right edge of the goggles’ polarized lens. The networked goggles aren’t cheap, though: They cost around €310. reconinstruments.com

GPS ON THE SLOPES Speed, altitude, and other data are clearly displayed on a small LCD screen embedded in the high-tech goggles.

ROBOT COLLEAGUE HELPS OUT IN SPACE (WASHINGTON, U.S.) NASA has sent its ﬁrst “robonaut” into orbit. Robonaut 2 is the name of the human-looking aluminum creature with a golden head that embarked on its ﬁrst mission aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery in February. The machine is dexterous enough to hold a pen and write simple words. Among other things, its job on the International Space Station (ISS) will be to remove bacterial deposits from the interior walls of the ISS. The housing for Robonaut 2 contains more than 250 sensors and 38 Intel processors. You can even read its tweets at @AstroRobonaut. robonaut.jsc.nasa.gov

U.S. correspondent for brand eins and the German edition of Technology Review. Areas of expertise: high tech and economics

MACHINES ON THE MARCH Pessimists look at it like this: The assumption of power by machines has been brought a step closer by the IBM supercomputer Watson’s victory over the best contestants in the history of the game show “Jeopardy.” Optimists counter by pointing out that artificial intelligence is now finally able to effectively help humans. Actually, both sides are right. Watson’s Jeopardy victory in 2011 will go down in technological history — but we’re still a long way from autonomous and intelligent machines. Indeed, Watson had to be trained for four years by two dozen IBM experts to achieve its victory. Things won’t get really interesting until we actually see the practical applications that can be created from unwieldy hardware monsters like Watson. These will include lightning-speed voice and image recognition, which in conjunction with cloud computing will turn every smartphone and every car into a mini-Watson — and at absolutely no cost. In just a few years, the human brain will be transformed into a completely new kind of tool for understanding the world through access to infinite computing power. Humans and bots will then join their synapses, but that certainly doesn’t mean they’ll be in predatory competition with one another. The question regarding the essence of intelligence won’t become relevant until upgradeable apps and sensors can be directly installed in human bodies. Whether that will be good or bad is not the point. Still, that day will come, so we had better start thinking about it now. A good starting point is offered by the humanmachine merging scenarios laid out by computer scientist Ray Kurzweil. A film entitled “Transcendent Man” was made about his ideas on this and other topics. Kurzweil has also actually calculated a date when a human jury will accept a computer as a thinking being: 2029. Until that point, millions of engineers and scientists (still) won’t have to worry about losing their jobs.

ASTRO ROBONAUT The crew of the ISS has been getting support from a robot since February.

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SPECTRUM

PERSPECTIVE Jochen WITTMANN Freelance foreign correspondent for Newsforum Eurotopics and numerous German-language dailies since 1993; based in London

SMART GRIDS The future is being rehearsed in Europe — and it seems to work. A total of 20,000 smart meters have been installed in private households in the Salzburg region of Austria. The intelligent electricity meters are linked to the Internet, which they use to transmit their readings of individual consumption to the Salzburg AG energy supply company. Pilot projects for a smart grid are being conducted in six model regions in Germany — from Cuxhaven to Baden-Württemberg. Plans in Finland call for 80 percent of all households to be equipped with smart meters by the end of 2013. There’s no doubt that smart grids are on the march throughout Europe. The vision is as simple as it is effective. It involves creating an intelligent network that integrates the generation, storage, and transmission of electricity; can compensate for peak loads; and can facilitate decentralized infeeding. If the plan is successful, efficiency will increase and costs will decline as a result. Industrial companies have already determined that smart grids are a growth market. Siemens revenues in the smart grid sector rose by ten percent last year. Deutsche Telekom’s IT division is also quickly moving into this lucrative market, and this year’s CeBIT trade fair featured a Smart Grid Summit for the first time. A major focus of this new sector is China, where smart grid market volume is expected to increase almost threefold to more than $60 billion by 2015. The biggest beneficiary of this development might be the environment. Greenpeace recently published a study which found that a smart grid in the EU could increase the share of energy being fed into the grid from renewable sources to 68 percent as early as 2030. However, this will require Europewide liberalization and the opening up of the energy market.

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ST. ASAPH, United Kingdom

BONN, Germany ZURICH, Switzerland PARIS, France

SCHAFFHAUSEN, Switzerland

THE WHOLE WORLD IN A COMPUTER (ZURICH, Switzerland) A team of scientists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) plans to build a Living Earth Simulator. The supercomputer will be part of the FuturICT project, which is designed to simulate the processes that occur on our planet — from the spread of infectious diseases to chaotic traffic on roads, changes in global weather, and the international flow of capital. To this end, the researchers plan to process millions of data points from private and public sources and Internet social media sites in order to generate a depiction of reality in the computer. This can then be used to make reliable predictions and issue warnings as to when the next financial crisis or flu epidemic is about to occur, for example. futurict.ethz.ch

SMARTKEM DEVELOPING ORGANIC SEMICONDUCTORS (ST. ASAPH, UK) The British startup SmartKem has received the Best of British Innovation 2010 award. The company, which has its headquarters in Wales, is developing a new generation of semiconductors that can be directly printed onto foils using organic materials. These components will replace silicon chips in the future. The Welsh government is heavily funding the associated research, and SmartKem is now looking to enter the East Asian microelectronics market with its new solution. The technology offers great beneﬁts because organic semiconductors are much cheaper to produce than silicon. They can also be printed onto ultra-thin and highly ﬂexible polymer layers. Application areas include intelligent packaging, ultra-light solar panels, and electronic screens. smartkem.com

WHERE’S MY CAR? (SCHAFFHAUSEN, Switzerland) Panic in the parking garage: Where did I park? Where’s my car? A new gadget produced by Garmin can help out here. The GTU 10 — a device about as large as a disposable lighter — uses GPS technology to pinpoint the exact location of the vehicle. It then sends the data in real time to the Garmin Tracker, which forwards it to the user via an Internet browser or smartphone app if so requested. The unit can also be used for other things besides ﬁnding cars. Garmin believes it’s highly suitable for monitoring mobile property or managing a company car ﬂeet, for example. buy.garmin.com

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Africa Asia/Paciﬁc region Eastern Europe Latin America Middle East North America 1,000 ,0

Western Europe

2008

2010

0 1,0 0

0,0 0

0 0,0

1,0 0

4G IN GERMANY (BONN, Germany) Telefónica, O2, and Deutsche Telekom have put the ﬁrst LTE pilot networks and locations into operation. 4G — or the fourth generation of mobile radio networks — is set to enter the key German mobile communications market. The companies had bid on the LTE licenses in the early summer of 2010. To be considered for a license, the companies had to pledge to provide low-coverage rural areas with broadband connections and take measures to ensure that 90 percent of the “dead zones” will be covered by 2016. Once they have achieved this, they will be able to begin marketing 4G in cities. Telekom has now announced a “4G Offensive” and is conﬁdent that it can attain the stipulated objectives sooner than required. 4G phone users will then enjoy Internet access at lightning speed with broadband transfer rates as high as 100 megabits per second and the downloading of videos as large as 7.5 MB in less than one second. telekom.com

2009

Broadband users (WiMAX) according to region (all ﬁgures for the ﬁrst quarters of 2008 through 2010). SOURCE: TeleGeography

EUROPE HIGH-TECH NEWS FROM AN INNOVATIVE REGION “The idea behind the smart grid is as simple as it is effective: to create an intelligent network that integrates and optimizes the generation, storage, and transmission of electricity.” Jochen WITTMANN, TECHNICITY correspondent, London

LIGHTRADIO TO RESCUE WIRELESS NETWORKS (PARIS, France) Experts are already warning of the coming crash: In two years at the latest, the mobile radio network will be totally overloaded because of an increasing number of smartphones and an ever-greater thirst for data on the part of their users. The Franco-American company Alcatel-Lucent recently presented a solution to this problem in the form of lightRadio — miniature base stations in small cubes with an edge length of six centimeters. These tiny units will replace conventional cell towers — and because they’re so small they can be installed more rapidly and easily than normal base stations, which usually encounter protests from local residents. The “Cube” also promises a green dividend in that it requires only half as much energy for its operation. alcatel-lucent.com

CUBE RADIO Small portable transmitters will support wireless networks.

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TEXT

PHOTOGRAPHY

Peter THOMAS

Berthold STEINHILBER

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START

The multiple Ironman champion Lothar Leder and Daimler test driver Armin Weinmann are well rested and ready to do their marathon training program together.

PEOPLE AND TECHNOLOGY Engineers and scientists are cooperating closely to get the best performance out of long-distance truckers and athletes. Their goal is to keep both groups of top performers permanently fit. 27

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very kilometer is a challenge in itself; every kilometer takes you one step closer to your distant goal. You have to stay strong and always remain focused — that’s the constant demand that must be fulfilled by the endurance specialists. Like professional triathletes, longdistance truckers know that the only way for them to succeed is to establish a rhythm between periods of high performance and moments of relaxation. Maximum performance can only be attained through fitness, and the key to good conditioning for both truckers and triathletes lies in a solid training plan. Athletes focus here on targeted preparation for their competitions. Lothar Leder — one of Germany’s best triathletes — trains intensively for six to eight weeks prior to a triathlon. Long-haul truckers, on the other hand, focus on enhancing, improving, and maintaining their condition over the long term. The physical and mental stress to which the two groups are subjected over the long distances they cover is also different. Athletes give their all on the day of the competition, fighting on to the finish with every last drop of energy they can muster. Truckers, however, think in terms of continuity, as the huge distances they travel each day require them to remain focused and concentrated. “The trend in Europe is moving toward long distances,” says Siegfried Rothe. “For drivers, this means living in the cab of their truck for up to 14 days.” Rothe is an engineer and the Head of Condition Enhancement at Daimler.

He and his project team develop rest, relaxation, ﬁtness, and health maintenance concepts for truckers and other individuals who spend a lot of time behind the wheel. A trucker clocks up several hundred kilometers every day. Those who transport goods across borders often spend one or two weeks on the road at a time. That adds up to several thousand kilometers that have to be traveled before they can return home. During this time, the cab serves as their workplace and living space. Whether it’s fruit from Spain or Italy being shipped to Berlin or machine components from southern Germany headed east, each trip helps to keep the modern ﬂow of goods moving — in Germany, in Europe, and around the world. In this economic system, time is money and the pressure is huge.

that must be covered in a time that for most athletes exceeds an eight-hour working day. In 1996 Leder became the world’s ﬁrst triathlete to ﬁnish under the magical eighthour mark in the legendary Ironman competition. For this professional athlete from Darmstadt, modern technology is just as important for meeting the Ironman challenge as are training and proper time management during the competition. “The triathlon has led to many new technical developments for sports in general,” says Leder. Such developments include everything from bicycle helmets to carbon bike frames. And the process is ongoing. “The pace of innovation here is truly explosive,” says Leder. Highly complex — although in a completely different way than in a triathlon — are

Only ﬁt and well-rested drivers can optimally exploit their expertise and economical and ecological driving style. Professor Jürgen ZULLEY Director of the Sleep Disorders Center at the University of Regensburg

Precise timing also creates stress for triathletes. They win or lose a competition on the basis of seconds or less, so their maximum physical exertion must come at exactly the right moment. The supreme “Ironman” competition encompasses 3.86 kilometers of swimming, 180 kilometers of cycling, and 42.195 kilometers of running — three marathon distances in three different disciplines

the stress factors that truckers are exposed to, especially when they are driving over very long distances. Basic conditions such as high trafﬁc congestion, short-interval supply chains, and a chronic shortage of parking spaces make the logistics of long-distance haulage a huge challenge. The mental tension that is generated can soon lead to physical stress and exhaustion.

TRIATHLON New dimensions in peak performance are made possible by technical reﬁnements that include everything from time trial helmets to carbon bicycle frames.

ENERGY RESERVES

A world-class triathlete can complete the full Ironman program in less than eight hours — the length of a longdistance trucker’s working day. Pacing is a crucial aspect for both of them.

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As part of its “TopFit Truck” project, Daimler Trucks has developed a research vehicle that offers marathon truckers a wealth of high-tech solutions to these problems. “More than anything else, we have signiﬁcantly enhanced comfort in the driver’s cab by means of a whole range of innovations,” Rothe explains as he invites us to enter the yellow tractor-trailer. Thinking outside the box of automotive technology is a given for Rothe, a mechatronics engineer, and that is why he recruited a broad range of partners to help with the de-

Product Engineering at Daimler Trucks. “All of the measures we’ve taken are designed to improve the working conditions in long-haulage trucks — and thus to enhance the quality of life for the drivers,” Weiberg says. This enhancement starts with programs to condition the body so that truckers remain strong, alert, and healthy over the long term. “You need to have a foundation for good endurance,” Leder explains. Laying this foundation requires continuous training — but also knowing when to take breaks and how to listen to one’s body. Truckers can actually

We have signiﬁcantly enhanced comfort in the driver’s cab by means of a whole range of innovations. Siegfried ROTHE Head of Condition Enhancement at Daimler Group Research

velopment of the TopFit Truck. The team included musicologists, sport scientists, sleep researchers, human biologists, psychologists, transport scientists, and cytophysiologists, to name just some of the disciplines represented. The goal of the working group that resulted was to develop solutions that would ensure better ergonomics and greater comfort in the truck of the future. This is important, because the vehicle is not only a workplace but also a temporary home for long-haulage truckers. Rothe’s vision of ergonomic trucks is shared by Georg Weiberg, Head of Truck

practice regular physical conditioning in their cabs every day — thanks to a ﬁnely tuned exercise program that the Daimler experts developed together with Prof. Gerhard Hehl and his team at Paracelsus Hospital in Ostﬁldern. The exercises require the use of expander straps that can be fastened to various hooks inside the cab. The TopFit Truck cockpit also offers a whole range of new and unusual operation features that are not available in a conventional vehicle. In addition, it contains a massage seat and a fold-out bed that is wider than usual. All of these special features cre-

ate an environment that reflects the changed attitude at Daimler regarding ergonomics and comfort in long-haulage trucks. The truck created by the TopFit Truck team is a singular vehicle that has been consistently designed with this attitude in mind — just as a customized racing bike is designed for use by a professional athlete. Indeed, both vehicles reflect the ongoing endeavor to improve the technology that already exists. “Trucks have been transformed into high-tech machines in recent years,” says Rothe. “But people who don’t drive trucks have not yet realized this fact.” A key aspect of the fundamental research that preceded the development of the TopFit Truck research vehicle was to fine-tune the relationship between the driver’s sleep and his or her driving behavior. After all, the crucial phases of rest and relaxation for truckers largely occur in the cab, which is then transformed into a living area and bedroom. Actually, good sleep should be important to everyone involved in the shipping business, according to Prof. Jürgen Zulley from the Sleep Disorders Center at the University of Regensburg. “That’s because only fit and well-rested drivers can optimally exploit their driving expertise and their economical and ecological driving style,” he says. Studies have in fact shown that truckers who don’t sleep well or long enough are less attentive while they are driving, and that they consume larger amounts of fuel as a result. (Continued on page 36)

TOPFIT TRUCK The Mercedes-Benz Actros cab underwent signiﬁcant comfort upgrades for its TopFit Truck version.

FRESH AIR MANAGEMENT Driver comfort is heavily dependent on the air quality in the cab. The TopFit Truck is equipped with an ionizer that cleans the air and thus ensures a constant supply of fresh air.

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THREE DISCIPLINES

By this time, the triathlete has usually ﬁnished swimming and has now mounted his or her high-tech bike. The world record for the 3.86-kilometer swimming segment is 41 minutes and 26 seconds.

Reduction of fatigue phases; maintenance of physical ﬁtness atigue is not a parameter that can be gauged through just one measurement,” says Dr. Roland Popp, a sleep researcher. Popp is the director of a project in which the University of Regensburg and Daimler studied the impact the quality of sleep has on truckers’ driving styles. Objective physical data on truckers is used to measure fatigue and lack of vigilance. Truckers are also asked to assess their own

attentiveness. Once all the information has been collected, the researchers determine the differences in driving performance caused by insufﬁcient sleep. The measurement techniques applied here include electroencephalograms and pupillometry, as well as motoric and long-term attentiveness tests. Established questionnaire methods are used to determine an individual driver’s perceived fatigue, which makes it possible to draw up fatigue scales.

ACTIVATION METHODS Stimulating massage feature in seats (various sitting postures) Stimulating mentholated ventilation Activation music program

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Economical and strategic exploitation of physical resources ruck drivers who travel over long distances, just like triathletes, need to ration their energy and maintain their physical, mental, and material resources as effectively as possible. Both groups are supported in these efforts by a whole range of technical measures and innovations, as well as specialized training programs.

Triathletes prepare for competitions with an individualized training program that focuses on phases of high performance and regeneration (e.g. jogging once a week). The training is toned down right before the competition, to allow the triathlete to accumulate and conserve energy. Regular stretching exercises, massages, and a balanced diet are a must for athletes in training and competition.

EQUIPMENT Use of special bicycle shoes whose pedal fasteners are located further back toward the anklebone â&#x20AC;&#x201D; this reduces stress on the calves while cycling.

ACTIVELY FIT

A quarter of the long-distance truckerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s working day is done. Initial signs of fatigue caused by factors such as monotony can be overcome with stretching exercises or mentholated ventilation.

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HALFTIME

High-tech equipment for athletes

Half of the marathon distance has been traveled at this point. It’s time now for the driver to take the legally required break — so it’s the ideal moment for Armin Weinmann’s power nap.

hysical methods are supplemented by numerous hightech innovations for maintaining ﬁtness and ensuring the delivery of maximum performance when it is needed. Ultimately, the decisive factor is the driver’s or athlete’s ability to concentrate. “90 percent of a competition is decided in the mind,” says the triathlete Lothar Leder.

ENERGY-SAVING ARM POSITION Racing handlebars that enable various gripping positions, along with aerodynamic handlebar extensions and a bar that is aligned with shoulder width

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Cost reductions through sustainable optimization of driver performance opFit Truck research has demonstrated that truckers who sleep badly or too little during the night drive more erratically and therefore consume about one liter more of diesel fuel per 100 kilometers than well-rested drivers. Given a total trucker driving distance of 27.6 billion kilometers per year on German highways alone in 2008, an improvement of the quality of sleep would generate savings of 276 million liters of diesel per

year. In order to ensure optimal exploitation of relaxation phases, Daimler has utilized the following parameters (among others) to create an ideal climate in the TopFit Truck interior: Driver cab noise insulation Wider bed (80 cm instead of the previous 60 cm) Fresh air management when the windows are closed (independent air conditioning and heating)

RELAXATION FEATURES AND EQUIPMENT Power nap with a relaxing massage function Pleasant orange scents Draft-free independent climate control unit

CONSERVING ENERGY

The 180-km cycling segment has been completed. Triathletes need to plan for low-exertion phases while running so as to be able to mobilize their full remaining energy at the end of the marathon.

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Complex measuring technology for performance diagnostics he performance diagnostic system provides key prerequisites for optimal training management and is also an outstanding instrument for monitoring the effectiveness of the training measures used. The diagnostic assessment of endurance generally includes a scaled test on the bicycle ergometer or treadmill ergometer. As the test proceeds, the stress intensity increases in accordance with deﬁned standardized parameters.

Pulse frequency and lactate measurements are considered standard here. Lactate is a metabolic end product that forms when the energy used for muscle contraction is made available from carbohydrate storage cells (anaerobes). The increase in physical stress throughout a competition raises both pulse frequency and lactate levels, whereby pulse frequency serves as a parameter of the stress intensity.

MEASUREMENT TECHNOLOGY Pulse reader PERFORMANCE DIAGNOSTICS Speedometer and odometer

LAST METERS

Lothar Leder was the world’s ﬁrst Ironman competitor to ﬁnish the competition below the magic number of eight hours (7:57:02 at Ironman Europe).

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Sustained efďŹ ciency enhancement training program for drivers argeted training measures strengthen muscles and prevent damage to joints. Within the framework of the TopFit Truck project, Daimler Trucks and Prof. Gerhard Hehl and his team at Paracelsus Hospital in OstďŹ ldern developed a concept that takes these exercises out of the gym and into the truck cab.

Here, straps fastened into hooks in various areas of the cabin are used by the driver to perform exercises for strengthening different muscle groups. Muscles that are particularly taxed when driving long distances are conditioned with this program. Expert instructions are available as a catalogue and a training video that was produced during the partnership.

TRAINING MEASURES Short expander straps Lat muscle exercise for strengthening the back Biceps training

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“We can only get better if we let ourselves take breaks,” is the training philosophy of triathlete Lothar Leder. That’s because breaks are a critical factor for an athlete’s ability to deliver top performance later on. Athletes therefore make sure they maintain a balance between regular periods of sleep, a good diet, and training before a competition in particular. Leder’s personal training strategy also includes planning training segments that require less exertion so as to enable him to achieve the best possible overall performance. The TopFit Truck program not only provides a passive atmosphere of comfort onboard but also actively inﬂuences the cab environment by emitting various relaxing or

A software program determines which song from the database of a trucker’s personal music collection is played — all in accordance with the driving situation at hand. In this manner, the driver’s attention is activated by playing fast and loud music during monotonous and quiet driving phases, for example. Conversely, quiet and more relaxing music is played during stressful driving phases. “In city trafﬁc and similar situations that place exceptionally high demands on driver coordination and concentration, the truck turns off the music completely,” Rothe explains. The personal music library is also used to create the proper atmosphere for the driver’s power nap. When the driver takes this brief nap, the TopFit Truck’s massage seat moves

We can only get better if we let ourselves take breaks. Lothar LEDER Triathlete and multiple Ironman champion

invigorating scents as required. This innovative stimulus feature was studied and developed by Daimler in cooperation with the cytophysiologist Prof. Hanns Hatt from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum. The emission of the scents is controlled by the onboard computer in accordance with the driving situation and the driver’s individual preferences. Prof. Hatt differentiates here between the effectiveness of scents that are perceived as pleasant and the effect of “scents that impact all people equally and acutely as ‘waker-uppers’ by triggering our ‘warning nerves’ — for example, menthol.” It may also be possible to use “antiscents” in the future, says Hatt. These are substances that attack molecules which transport scents that people perceive as unpleasant. “This type of application has potential not only for trucks but also for passenger cars,” says the cytophysiologist. The truck’s onboard electronics system also includes a unique digital music database. This is an important element of the project, because music is more than art or entertainment, according to Prof. Günther Rötter from the Institute for Music and Musicology at the University of Dortmund. Music can in fact inﬂuence up to 50 different parameters of the human organism — from pulse rate to blood ﬂow in the brain and the release of certain hormones. The TopFit Truck exploits this phenomenon by selectively playing different types of music.

to a very high position, allowing the driver to place his or her legs onto a round cushion that is put over the steering wheel. And although a triathlete can’t stop for a power nap during a competition, he or she can feel how energy returns during triathlon segments that require less exertion, such as downhill bicycle stretches or phases of a run when there is a strong tailwind. The trucker hears quiet relaxing music when he or she takes a break. Later on, increasingly stimulating songs are played as the driver is woken up and put in a positive mood in preparation for the next segment of the marathon journey..

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article:

daimler-technicity.com/en/topﬁt-truck including the following features: • INTERVIEW with Georg WEIBERG, Head of Truck Product Engineering at Daimler • BACKGROUND Wide awake at the wheel: surveys about the sleeping patterns of truck drivers • PHOTO GALLERY The making of (photo session for the article)

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FINISH

The two marathon experts have managed to meet the extreme demands of this long-distance journey, thanks to their physical ďŹ tness and state-of-theart technology.

DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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TEXT R端diger ABELE

TYPE | TYP

TOPIC | THEMA

Mercedes-AMG

Drive Systems

COMMENT | KOMMENTAR

Packing a new high-performance powertrain, the CL 63 AMG shows how cutting-edge technology can continue to boost the potential of the classic combustion engine. YEAR | JAHR

2011

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RATING | BEWERTUNG

A top-class high-performance automobile.

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CONSUMPTION AND CO2 | VERBRAUCH UND CO2 Fuel consumption city/highway/combined: 14.4/8.2/10.5 l/100 km; CO2 emissions combined: 244 g/km The figures do not refer to a specific individual vehicle and are not part of any product offering, but instead are presented solely for purposes of comparison between various vehicle types.

CL 63 AMG WITH PERFORMANCE PACKAGE Cylinder arrangement: V8 Cylinder angle: 90° Valves per cylinder: 4 Displacement: 5,461 cm3 Bore × stroke: 98.0 × 90.5 mm Distance between cylinders: 106 mm Compression ratio: 10.0 : 1 Power output: 420 kW (571 hp) at 5,500/min Max. torque: 900 Nm at 2,250 - 3,750/min Max. rpm: 6,500/min NEDC overall consumption: 10.5 l/100 km CO2 emissions: 244 g/km Acceleration 0 –100 km/h: 4.4 s Top speed: 300 km/h*

AUTOMOBILE SCULPTURE | AUTOMOBILE SKULPTUR

*electronically limited

TECHNOLOGY | TECHNOLOGIE The standard-fitted direct-steer system, torque vectoring brake, and crosswind stabilization system further improve the vehicle’s agility and active driving safety. The powertrain is all-new. In combination with the AMG Speedshift MCT seven-speed sports transmission, the AMG 5.5-liter V8 biturbo engine substantially reduces fuel consumption and emissions while at the same time boosting output and performance.

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ENGINE TECHNOLOGY I MOTORENTECHNOLOGIE Engine block A sophisticated lightweight die-cast structure made completely of aluminum. Intake valve Especially large dimensions enable perfect filling of the combustion chambers. Valve spring An important part of the valve train, which is highly dynamic overall. Exhaust valve Hollow-bored and sodium-cooled technology from motor sports. High-performance camshaft For highly precise valve control, irrespective of the load and the engine speed.

PRECISION | PRÄZISION High-performance injector with piezo actuators

The all-new high-pressure piezo injectors can make up to five highly precise injections in each combustion cycle. All of the parameters are continuously electronically regulated.

TYPE | TYP

TOPIC | THEMA

AMG V8 Biturbo

Engine

COMMENT | KOMMENTAR

The world’s most efﬁcient V8 engine, with an output of 420 kW, consumes on average only 10.5 liters of gasoline per 100 kilometers. Such peak values were still unattainable only a few years ago. YEAR | JAHR

2011

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RATING | BEWERTUNG

A new benchmark in engine technology.

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PERFECTION | PERFEKTION Four valves, continuously variable camshaft adjustment

Engine operation is very precise. The four camshafts play a key role in that they control the engineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 32 intake and exhaust valves with continuously variable adjustment that always ensures optimal output and torque.

PRESSURE CHARGING | AUFLADUNG

The AMG V8 biturbo engineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s two turbochargers (one per cylinder bank) generate power from the atmosphere by providing the engine with compressed fresh air. This boosts combustion performance and consequently engine output. An extremely large intercooler was installed to ensure that the engine gets enough air even at full load. The system cools down the compressed intake air before it enters the combustion chambers, thereby optimizing output and torque.

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GEAR TECHNOLOGY | GETRIEBETECHNIK Lightweight magnesium transmission housing Contributes to the system’s low overall weight of 80 kilograms. Planetary gear sets An automatic transmission’s core elements for enabling gearshifting without any interruption of the power ﬂow. Clutch and brake Parts of the automatic transmission that engage in highly complex interaction. Torsion damper spring For the effective decoupling of vibrations. Structure of the wet start-up clutch Six clutch pack discs ensure optimal power transmission.

TYPE | TYP

TOPIC | THEMA

AMG Speedshift MCT

Transmission

COMMENT | KOMMENTAR

Featuring seven gears, three driving modes, and double-clutching, the AMG Speedshift MCT sports transmission can ﬂexibly and individually adjust handling and driving properties. YEAR | JAHR

2011

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RATING | BEWERTUNG

The highest level of sportiness and comfort.

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TRANSMISSION | KRAFTÜBERTRAGUNG Wet start-up clutch

The transmission has a wet start-up clutch, which combines the direct feedback of a manual transmission with the great convenience of an automatic transmission and ensures that gears are shifted without any power loss.

COMBINATION | KOMBINATION

TRANSMISSION | KRAFTÜBERTRAGUNG A vehicle’s power, dynamism, and efficiency depend not only on the engine but also on intelligent power transmission. The innovative AMG Speedshift MCT seven-speed sports transmission is agile, very responsive, and comparatively light. It also minimizes friction losses, ensures a comfortable driving experience, and has a fuel-efficient “mindset.” In the Controlled Efficiency driving mode, the start-stop function is also continuously active for the first time in a Mercedes-AMG car. The result is a The driving experience in the CL 63 AMG is defined by the combination

comprehensive system that considerably reduces fuel consumption while at the

of a sports engine with a sports transmission.

same time further boosting comfort and driving pleasure.

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he engine is the heart of an automobile. This powerhouse underneath the hood provides the necessary propulsion, defines the vehicle’s character, and is the primary partner in the interactive chain with the person behind the steering wheel. Through the activation of the gas pedal, the engine propels the vehicle forward by providing the appropriate force. The fascination of engines continues unabated. Although cars in the future might have a different drive system that is powered by batteries or fuel cells, for example, the year when large numbers of electric cars will be found on our roads is still very remote. Until then, the combustion engine will continue to power automobiles into the future and will make further major advances, particularly with regard to performance and fuel efficiency. Presentation of the Mercedes-Benz CL 63 AMG. Even though all of the CL series coupes shine brightly in the automotive firmament, the CL 63 AMG gleams with a special brilliance. The car’s drive unit is currently the most efficient V8 engine in the world, generating up to 420 kW (571 hp) and up to 900 Nm of torque. However, it only consumes 10.5 liters of gasoline per 100 kilometers (NEDC measuring method, New European Driving Cycle) and therefore emits 244 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer. Such figures would have been unattainable just a few years ago, but cutting-edge technology is making this new benchmark possible. The new engine is also a pioneer when it comes to efficiency, for which it is setting standards throughout the industry. The company aims to continuously reduce fuel consumption and the associated carbon dioxide emissions so that the environmental impact can be kept as low as possible. To achieve these tough goals, the engineers employed the best technology available for the CL 63 AMG. The engine with the in-house designation M 157 has a V-shaped block of eight cylinders and a total displacement of 5.5 liters. Although these facts alone ensure that the drive unit delivers high performance, various supporting measures had to be implemented in order to turn the system into a high-performance sports engine for Mercedes-AMG. The most important ones were the installation of two turbochargers with charge-air cooling, gasoline direct injection with piezo injectors, and variably adjustable camshafts. Added to this is the Speedshift MCT seven-speed sports transmission, which is an outstanding piece of technology in its own right. Each component contributes to the vehicle’s overall efficiency. More power despite lower fuel consumption. In order to achieve these seemingly contradictory goals as effectively as possible, the engine specialists from Mercedes-AMG for the first time combined a smaller displacement than that of the predecessor unit with twin superchargers and spray-guided combustion. Turbochargers are a tried and tested method for boosting performance. They provide engines with compressed fresh air, which improves combustion and thus

TYPE | TYP

boosts engine performance. The M 157 has two turbochargers — one for each bank of cylinders. The boost pressure is 1 bar, or 1.3 bar if the vehicle is equipped with the optional Performance Package. The peak values mentioned above are achieved with the Performance Package. But even without it, the engine still boasts an impressive 400 kW (544 hp) of output and 800 Nm of torque. An extremely large intercooler was installed in order to ensure that the engine gets enough air even at full load. The system cools down the compressed intake air before it enters the combustion chambers, thereby optimizing the output and the torque. DEVELOPMENT OF OUTPUT AND TORQUE OF THE CL 63 AMG WITHOUT AND WITH (RED LINE) THE PERFORMANCE PACKAGE. Torque (Nm)

Output (kW) 450

400

350

1,000

300

900

250

800

200

700

150

600

100

500

Engine speed (rpm)

A combustion engine exploits the power of tamed ﬁre. A spray of fuel is ignited in the engine’s combustion chambers, and the force of the resulting explosion moves a piston whose translational motion is in turn transformed into a rotary motion, which is ultimately transmitted to the wheels to propel the car. When the aim is to achieve maximum efﬁciency, as much power as possible has to be extracted from each drop of fuel. The key to attaining this goal is the creation of a homogeneous fuel-air mixture in the cylinder to ensure optimal combustion that is as clean as possible. To this end, the V8 biturbo engine has all-

TOPIC | THEMA

Art of Engineering Eﬃciency COMMENT | KOMMENTAR

Higher output despite lower fuel consumption. The unique combination of engine and transmission enables the new CL 63 AMG sports car to achieve a high level of efﬁciency. YEAR | JAHR

2011

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RATING | BEWERTUNG

Has easily achieved seemingly contradictory goals.

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new high-pressure piezo injectors that provide exactly the right dose of fuel for each driving situation. The high-tech injectors are accurate to within a millisecond and can make up to ﬁve highly precise injections per combustion cycle. An electronic control unit ensures that exactly the right amount of fuel is always added at exactly the right time and injection pressure. This enables the engine to always achieve maximum torque while at the same time reducing fuel consumption and emissions.

“The new Mercedes -AMG is designed to be totally reliable even under extreme conditions.” Anton KERCKHOFF Project manager for engine development at Mercedes-AMG

The engine speed can be as high as 6,500 rpm, and the maximum torque is 800 or 900 Nm. To achieve both values, the engine requires a highly dynamic valve gear that can withstand the tremendous forces and the extreme exhaust gas temperatures of up to 1,000 degrees Celsius. The camshaft therefore plays a key role in the engine concept, as it controls the opening and closing of the valves. On the intake side, each of the V8 biturbo engine’s cylinders has two comparatively large valves in order to quickly ﬁll the combustion chamber with an air-fuel mixture. Once the combustion process is completed, the exhaust gas is ejected through two exhaust valves. The engine has four overhead camshafts to control a total of 32 valves. The camshafts are continuously and variably adjustable, depending on both the loads and the engine speed. All of these properties impressively demonstrate how precise today’s combustion engines are, while also being extremely durable. Like every other engine from Mercedes-AMG, the new AMG drive unit is designed to be totally reliable and deliver top operating performance even if the owner uses the CL 63 AMG under extreme conditions. “The car is made for just such uses,” says Anton Kerckhoff, project manager for engine development at Mercedes-AMG. Each engine is completely assembled by a single person, who ensures that the utmost care is taken in this work and signs his or her name on the plaque attached to the engine. The result is an engine that operates wonderfully in tune with the supply of gasoline and responds very quickly to movements of the gas pedal — which is just what AMG customers want. The huge torque of 800 Nm is already available at 2,000 rpm, and even reaches

900 Nm at 2,250 rpm in cars equipped with the Performance Package. In both cases this means that even very heavy vehicles can in practice achieve high speeds extremely quickly: from 0 to 100 km/h in 4.5 seconds for the standard model and just 4.4 seconds for vehicles with the Performance Package. Top speed is limited to 250 km/h for the standard model and 300 km/h for vehicles with the Performance Package. The CL 63 AMG wouldn’t be a product of the high-performance division in Affalterbach if its overall properties didn’t make it a sports vehicle. The chassis, for example, sets new standards, ideally hugging the road in every situation and providing the greatest possible comfort at all times. The brakes are designed to handle the most demanding conditions and can decelerate the coupe quickly and safely even when traveling at top speeds. The Speedshift MCT seven-speed sports transmission contributes to the vehicle’s great performance and also plays an important role in boosting efficiency. The system is not an automatic transmission with a lock-up clutch, but instead has a so-called wet start-up clutch that ensures fuel-efficient gearshifting without any power loss. Featuring a total of seven gears, three driving modes, and double-clutching, the transmission can variably and individually adjust handling and driving properties. In addition, the Controlled Efficiency driving mode allows the start-stop function to be activated at the push of a button for the first time in a Mercedes-AMG car. All of this effort has been well rewarded. “The new V8 engine consumes less fuel than all of its direct competitors,” says Kerckhoff. “What’s more, it consumes over 25 percent less fuel than the predecessor models with naturally aspirated V8 engines.” All of this underscores the powertrain’s high standards — and the fact that the internal combustion engine still has a tremendous amount of potential.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article:

daimler-technicity.com/en/cl63-amg including the following features: • INTERVIEW Anton KERCKHOFF, project manager for engine development at Mercedes-AMG, explains why the CL 63 AMG is a symbol of innovative automobile development • VIDEO This video demonstrates that the CL 63 AMG is not only packed full of high technology but is also synonymous with stylish elegance • PHOTO GALLERY A close look at the Mercedes CL 63 AMG

ACCURACY | SORGFALT

TRADITION | TRADITION

All of the powertrains are put together by hand by especially qualified experts

Mercedes-AMG has a long and successful history of developing powerful V8

at the ultramodern AMG engine manufacturing facility in Affalterbach. Each of

engines with impressive torques. Founded in 1967, the company originally

the technicians is responsible for assembling an entire engine from the first to

developed powerful racing car engines. The experience gained in motor sports

the last screw and documents this fact with his or her signature on the engine

was used to develop optimized powertrains which turned Mercedes’ luxury sedans

plaque in order to show that the utmost care was taken during production.

into sports cars that are suitable for normal roads. Numerous honors, such as

After the assembly is completed, each engine undergoes extensive testing.

the renowned “Engine of the Year Awards”, underscore the high standards of

The aim is to ensure a high level of driving pleasure during a long service life

the Mercedes-Benz performance division.

over many kilometers.

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ANALOGY

Crew: up to 2 people Field of vision: 360 degrees

Foldable wings

Airbag

Digital instruments and heads-up display

Maximum diving depth: 300 m

Electric motor Redundant oxygen supply Top speed: 6 knots (11 km/h)

MARITIME MOBILITY

Lithium-phosphate battery: charging time of 4–6 hours

DEEP FLIGHT SUPER FALCON Vision: Independent, simple, environmentally neutral deep sea exploration Type: Fourth generation of small, agile winged submersibles Nickname: “Learjet of the Seas” Debut: 2008, off the coast of California Range: 45 km Body: Epoxy resin, acrylic glass Further information: deepﬂight.com

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URBAN MOBILITY

SMART ESCOOTER CONCEPT Vision: Intelligent, comfortable, locally emission-free exploration of big cities Type: Agile electric scooter with smart genes Nickname: â&#x20AC;&#x153;Electric smart on two wheelsâ&#x20AC;? Debut of the concept vehicle: 2010, at the Paris Motor Show Range: Up to 100 km Body: Aluminum, steel Further information: smart.com

Digital instruments networked via a smartphone Solar cells

Blind spot assist

Airbag

Charging socket

ABS Riders: up to 2 people (foldout passenger seat)

Maximum range: up to 100 km

Lithium-ion battery package (charging time of 3-5 hours)

Top speed: 45 km/h

Wheel-hub electric motor with 4 kW of output

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ABILITY, TALENT <Eng.> n; -ies, -s (abbr. A, T) “Spare no effort to attract attention with whatever particular scientiﬁc TALENTS (see p. 62, “Metropolis”) you might have, but do not devote yourself to a single specialty. Try to develop a clear UNDERSTANDING (see p. 66, “Transfer”) of everything. Do not abandon any area of science entirely, because all SCIENCE (see p. 50, “Always On”) is one.” Lucius Annaeus SENECA (*1 – † 65 AD), Roman philosopher, natural scientist, and statesman.

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TEXT

Y A S O W L N A

Steffan HEUER

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Computing power, Internet access, and eversmaller sensors are already omnipresent. As a result, every person and every vehicle is becoming part of a global nervous system. Soon entire societies and economies will follow. A journey through a life without an off switch.

Circle 01 BODY AREA NETWORK Pills that send radio signals to doctors; cell phones that replace ECGs; stethoscopes that physicians on the other side of the globe can use — all of this exists already. “In a few years,” says Don Jones from the California-based chip manufacturer Qualcomm, “every person and even every organ will have something like its own Internet or IP address.” Bodies will be able to communicate with sensors and medical devices in a type of health telematics system. In this vision, which experts refer to as “e-health,” measuring devices fitted on and even inside the body will continually and inconspicuously collect and transmit vital data to computer centers via interfaces such as cell phones, home routers, or vehicle communication units. Consumer electronics in the physical fitness and wellness sector are showing the way forward. Devices like fitbit and Nike Plus monitor users when they’re jogging or even sleeping. These units are being joined by other networked devices such as scales, pulse readers, and blood-sugar readers that not only collect and upload data but also automatically establish contact with doctors when specific thresholds are exceeded. Preventive care and treatment is thus making the great leap onto the Web, just as more sensors and connected software take care of, or ease, the tasks normally performed by people. Ideally, medical support should be provided before someone needs to go to a doctor or hospital. “Networked health care not only improves the quality of life and therapeutic treatments for patients; it also saves society money and opens up possibilities for new business models that can be used by everyone from IT network providers to pharmaceutical companies,” says Jones, who through his membership in several umbrella organizations is helping to build this “body area network.” The network on and inside the body is enabled by more than five billion cell phones. Every seventh such device (around 700 million) was using the world’s fastest data networks (UMTS/3G and LTE/4G) by the end of 2010. The phones will be supplemented by an ever-greater number of networked wireless sensors worn on the body. According to market experts at ABI Research, more than 400 million such miniature transmitters will be sold each year between now and 2014. T

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DRIVE AND SURF — COMAND Online

Internet-based infotainment system from Mercedes-Benz.

Features: ➔ Navigation ➔ Internet radio ➔ Telephone ➔ Web services ➔ Flexible updating of offboard applications

The new Mercedes-Benz SLK and the modelupdated Mercedes-Benz C-Class have been connected to the Internet since March 2011. The system comes with a browser and services such as global weather forecasts that also provide information on snow depth in skiing areas. New onboard services in the vehicle make it possible for users to conduct Google local searches for points of interest and download destinations and individual route plans from Google Maps.

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Circle 02 HOME AREA NETWORK One’s own vehicle and home are perhaps the most important interfaces when it comes to brokering the flow of data between individuals and their immediate and distant environments. Already today, every Mercedes-Benz E-Class and S-Class vehicle is equipped with 40 to 50 small computers that not only collect and evaluate data from the vehicle’s engine and transmission but also use sensors to probe the immediate environment for obstacles and uneven road surfaces. These devices are increasingly communicating with Web service providers via fast connections in order to enhance safety and comfort. “Actually, we’re now networked everywhere — the last dead zone is the car,” says Bharat Balasubramanian, head of Product Innovation and Process Technologies at Daimler Group Research and Advanced Engineering. There were some two billion people with Internet access worldwide at the beginning of 2011. “More and more people want the things they can do with smartphones and laptops to be possible in their vehicles as well,” Balasubramanian explains, adding that this is the reason why the households and vehicles of tomorrow will have at least one router of their own, while high-speed wireless networks with sufficient coverage are continually expanded. Cars will then become supercomputers on wheels. The new infotainment system in the Mercedes-Benz SLK and Mercedes-Benz C-Class enables users not only to search Google in a browser but also to access favorite Web services such as weather forecasts. These services are optimized in line with the driver’s needs via a special backend service at a Daimler computer center. The whole package will soon be expanded to include voice recognition for text entry and text output in relation to offboard services. As a result, business people will always be able to keep in touch — even out on the road. “Thanks to their smartphones, our customers can already stay linked to the Internet,” says Johann Jungwirth, head of Mercedes-Benz Research & Development North America in Palo Alto, California. “The key thing now is to figure out how to perfectly integrate such phones into a vehicle in a way that no one will get distracted when using them. It’s becoming increasingly crucial to ensure simple and intuitive operation of all services and applications that

are important to a user. At the same time, aesthetically pleasing and sophisticated graphic depiction with attention to detail plays a key role in the perception of value.” Whereas permanent connectivity in a car traveling at 130 kilometers per hour still poses technical challenges — especially with regard to wireless network infrastructures — the connection possibilities available today have revitalized homes and offices. Smart electricity meters in smart grids transmit consumption data to energy suppliers, while household devices send comparative data to homeowners’ iPhones that can be used to cut consumption and improve maintenance. Flexible concepts like hotdesking and hotelling have made entire office buildings as freely configurable as software. When an employee passes a chip card or machinereadable ID over a scanner, the room lighting, heating, and a currently available computer are automatically adjusted to his or her personal preferences, which are stored in the network. The infrastructure for this type of intelligent building is provided by IT firms — for example, by the networking expert Cisco Systems. Initial prototypes have been set up in cities such as New Songdo in South Korea — a country whose average data transfer rate of 17 megabits per second (Mbps) and top speeds of up to 44 Mbps make it the world leader. By comparison, fast wireless networks currently accommodate rates of between 300 kilobits and two megabits per second, depending on location and speed. Connections between networked vehicles and their surroundings open up previously unimaginable possibilities — particularly for future drive system technologies, says Ralf Lamberti, who is responsible for infotainment and telematics innovations at Daimler. If an electric vehicle knows its destination, it can manage the battery charging management system and thus improve the efficiency and service life of the expensive battery. “Connectivity can actively control such operations — for example, by communicating with the charging station,” says Lamberti. “The overall operating costs are reduced as a result.”

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NETWORKED ONBOARD SYSTEMS

Researchers working under Bharat Balasubramanian, head of Product Innovations and Process Technologies at Daimler Group Research and Advanced Engineering, are striving to achieve the goal of “accident-free driving” and create comfort features that make driving easier. The focus here is on onboard systems that utilize networked devices such as cameras and sensors. Such systems are now also using data from the Web to increase advance warning times and make the exchange of information possible among vehicles and with the infrastructure. Daimler has already achieved many milestones on the road toward the intelligent vehicle.

Daimler researchers have also successfully demonstrated the following technologies:

➔ An avoidance assistant whose camera identifies pedestrians crossing a street and automatically initiates an avoidance maneuver or applies full braking pressure. ➔ A traffic jam assistant in the F 800 Style concept car. This system uses a new type of stereo camera that monitors lane markings and the vehicle in front. The car also takes care of longitudinal and transverse movements at speeds of up to 40 kilometers per hour. Here, if necessary, it even intervenes to correct steering maneuvers. ➔ Magic Body Control — a three-dimensional undulating road-surface recognition system. Here, a stereo camera monitors the road ahead and generates a surface unevenness profile. The profile is automatically forwarded to the active chassis, which compensates

Circle 03 METROPOLITAN AREA NETWORK Expanding this form of ad hoc cooperation between humans and machines to an entire region leads to the creation of “conscious cities.” Most people now live in cities, and the trend toward urbanization is accelerating. Academics such as Carlo Ratti at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) are therefore studying how urban residents and vehicles — and that means everything from bicycles to buses — might exchange information with streets and buildings to improve life. The aim is to enhance speed, efficiency, safety, and sustainably. For example, those who permit the uploading of data from their home area network or vehicle to an urban network can create local daily “mashups” — upto-date relevant information that helps humans and machines adapt to the pulse of modern society. This data exchange can lead to the identification of potential traffic jams before they arise. It can also provide urban planners with valuable insights. Telematics service providers such as TomTom and the Nokia subsidiary NavTeq already employ this technique to improve route planning. To this end, they use realtime data from millions of navigation systems and cell phones. Daimler’s car2go and car2gether mobility concepts also utilize such hyperlocal networking systems to make the shortterm use of vehicles and realtime ridesharing possible. This huge range of compartmentalized information from daily urban life can also be linked with parameters such as air quality and noise levels, which can be measured — for example, by inexpensive sensors fitted to the frames of hundreds of bikesharing bicycles. This creates a new discipline known as “citizen science,” which enables individuals to collect data directly from the source more or less by just walking or riding past it. Researchers believe all these measurement and controlling stations are forming the contours of an “Internet of Things,” in which the omnipresent cell phone acts as a universal door-opener, as Burkhard Järisch from the Daimler Society and Technology Research Group in Berlin puts it.

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Circle 04 PREDICTIVE CRUISE CONTROL

WORLDWIDE NETWORK

Unlike conventional cruise control, the Predictive Cruise Control system adjusts the engine output in Daimler Trucks’ Freightlinerbrand vehicles in accordance with uphill and downhill gradients.

GPS-based cruise control

The system employs satellite-controlled GPS technology and digitized 3D maps. The data thus obtained is used by the onboard computer to calculate the optimum speed for maximizing fuel economy. Fuel savings are achieved by adapting the preset cruise control speed without reducing the average speed: What the truck loses in speed going uphill is offset by the momentum gained going downhill later on. This assistance system was developed by engineers at Daimler research departments in Stuttgart, Germany, and Portland, Oregon. The system already stores data on more than 200,000 miles (approx. 350,000 kilometers) of the roads most frequently used by trucks in the 48 contiguous U.S. states.

The huge number of sensors and networked devices ensures high quality. When millions of digital eyes and ears can see, listen, and measure relevant parameters, the result is a new dimension of the information society — one that improves logistics and crisis management. Sooner or later, the entire planet will be linked to the realtime network. The technology company Hewlett-Packard calls this vision CeNSE, or Central Nervous System for the Earth. It all started with permanent access to text data. Then came navigation aided by images and photos such as those provided by Google Earth or Streetview. Computer scientist Stephen Wolfram, who created the Wolfram Alpha search engine, already envisions a world in which software systems communicate with one another and sensors act autonomously without human intervention. In this world, onboard computers automatically read vehicle diagnostic data and send it to a repair center, whose computer system orders any spare parts required and schedules a repair appointment before the driver has even called customer service. Technologists expect that the next quantum leap will involve video feeds that gradually spread across the planet. To this end, Daimler researchers are teaching the vehicles of tomorrow how to “see” with stereo cameras. Developers of the Microsoft search engine Bing are creating a virtual “walk-through world” with the help of a mosaic consisting of millions of photos. “An increasing number of live cameras will be

embedded in digital maps over the next few years,” says Microsoft manager Chris Pendelton. “The whole world will hook up with these systems and people and software will look in.” Experts believe video streams will account for two-thirds of all wireless network activity by 2014. By then, the amount of video footage that ﬂows through the global IP network each second will be so large that it would take a person two years to view it all.

“We will soon be sitting in front of several large high-resolution screens in our cars.” Ralf LAMBERTI Director of Infotainment, Telematics, and Cabin E/E at Daimler Group Research & Advanced Engineering

This flood of images opens up unimaginable possibilities for smartphones — for example, when it comes to the automatic recognition of buildings and individuals in viewfinders or camera feeds or the provision of the latest notifications or warnings in the form of augmented reality. This mixed display of reality and the Web world will soon find its way into vehicles. Says Lamberti: “We will soon be sitting in front of several large high-resolution screens in our cars. It will be like a cinema with a Web connection! Anything is possible in a technical sense. But what should we be looking at on these screens, and will what we see enhance comfort and safety?”

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BEHIND THE SCENES: DAIMLER VEHICLE BACKEND

Circle 05 THE POTENTIALLY VICIOUS CIRCLE

It’s by no means a given that Google search results or weather forecasts can be displayed in a vehicle without distracting the driver. However, thanks to the Daimler Vehicle Backend that can’t happen. As soon as the driver starts a search, the onboard computer establishes a connection to a computer center via a wireless network.

Data query in seconds:

➔ 0.15–0.5 seconds: The onboard computer connects to the Daimler computer center. ➔ 0.05 seconds: The center’s server requests the desired data from a Web service such as Google. ➔ Maximum of 0.5 seconds: The answer from the Web service arrives. ➔ 0.2 seconds: The answer is compressed and reformatted for the head unit in the vehicle. ➔ Maximum of 1 second: The requested data appears on the vehicle display.

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A permanently networked environment not only brings to mind unresolved questions regarding driver distraction and the reliability of the external data drivers receive. More than anything else, it will have an unforeseeable impact on the way we live and work. After all, it will be possible to globally register, analyze, and store the associated data. Technologies embedded in everyday activities will keep their users constantly occupied, create new types of stress due to multitasking, and possibly even affect an individual’s ability to concentrate. As a result, visionary thinkers such as Viktor Mayer-Schönberger from Oxford University, or Jonathan Zittrain from Harvard, are calling for expiration dates for the neverending ﬂow of data. They even advocate a kind of personal data bankruptcy in order to dispose of digital waste. “It’s a potentially vicious cycle,” Mayer-Schönberger warns. “If you’re unable to forget, you can’t learn new things. As a result, people and societies can’t develop further.” In the extreme case, those who become slaves to their devices and online services — all of which require constant attention, updating and, above all, time — will themselves become a “gadget,” warns Jaron Lanier, a digital visionary from California, in his book “You Are Not a Gadget.” The technology of the new century will then take on a life of its own — one that people will have to adapt to. Evolution will be turned on its head when the Web dictates how people communicate and act. Kevin Kelly, a Web theoretician and founder of the cult magazine “Wired,” believes the “technium” — the entirety of all the technology that surrounds us — has already come to life. Kelly says the engineers who created the subservient spirits, as well as all consumers and knowledge workers, are now under the spell of their creations. What’s

more, he says, the off switches that could turn the clock back no longer exist. Things haven’t yet progressed that far, however, because many of the technologies described here are still in their infancy and a long way from forming a uniform nervous system. The planet is only gradually moving toward this system — smartphone by smartphone, sensor by sensor, Web service by Web service, and App by App. Moreover, we still have the ability to switch off, according to Heinrich Arnold, head of Innovation Development at Deutsche Telekom Laboratories in Berlin. “Many technical systems in our environments will always be on in the future, but they will operate discreetly in the background and will act as a service provider when we call upon them,” says Arnold. “They will also permit us to do without them if we so desire.” Until that time, programmers, companies, politicians, and citizens will have the opportunity to deﬁne a framework for the new online world and jointly determine — click by click — how much intelligent connectivity they want in order to improve their work atmosphere, their mobility, and their private lives. The balancing act has already begun.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article:

daimler-technicity.com/en/always-on including the following features: • INTERVIEW “Society is now networked”: Ralf LAMBERTI, Director of Infotainment and Telematics at Daimler, talks about using Web services and Apps behind the wheel • BACKGROUND (1) How much is too much? Do customers want to tweet and signal? (2) The maps of tomorrow: Virtual navigation • VIDEO Augmented reality: Reality 2.0

08.04.11 16:55

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Bharat BALASUBRAMANIAN, Head of Product Innovations and Process Technologies at Daimler Group Research and Advanced Engineering, on the risks and opportunities associated with permanently networked vehicles.

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08.04.11 16:55

LEADING THE WAY Mr. Balasubramanian, how much Web connectivity does a car need and how much is desirable? Over the last few years, we’ve seen an exponential increase in the number of electronic control devices in vehicles. A well-equipped Mercedes-Benz S-Class or E-Class now contains 40 to 50 small computers — including everything from traditional engine and transmission controls to mono-cameras. The number of such units is increasing because we’re installing more and more comfort and assistance systems. There’s actually no end in sight. We want to lead the way toward accident-free and zero-emission driving. More than 90 percent of all innovations require control units, hardware, and embedded software in one form or another. DIGITAL NATIVES Do customers already expect the Web to follow them into their vehicles? Actually, we’re now networked everywhere — the last dead zone is the car. Surveys of young adults show they want their networked life to extend to their vehicles, which means we need to offer solid and intelligent solutions to these digital natives. The things they already do today will become standard behavior sooner or later, and so we will make automobiles part of the cloud as well. This means that in the future you’ll be able to utilize online services anytime and anywhere — including in your car. INNOVATION CYCLE How quickly can new Web services be incorporated into vehicles? The situation is much better than it used to be thanks to our Daimler Vehicle Backend, to which our vehicles are connected. As a result, it’s now possible to transfer new functions into the vehicle from the Internet at any time. In this manner, we have decoupled the years-long innovation cycles in cars from the incredibly short cycles on the Internet and in the consumer electronics sector. And that’s only the beginning. A lot is also going to happen in terms of data transfer rates. Right now, we’ve got 3G or UMTS — but we’re already seeing the ﬁrst regions switch over to the next generation of 4G and LTE. BANDWIDTH Why is the mobile communication standard so important? A 4G network provides better coverage and higher bandwidths. Both are very important because permanent networking can only function properly in a car if you’ve got a fast connection that doesn’t break down at high

speeds. The second thing you need is full coverage so as to be able to request offboard operations and get the results into the vehicle. It’s going to take years to achieve all of this. That’s why you need to carefully consider the mix of onboard and offboard features in the meantime. A premium automaker like Daimler therefore needs to critically view the euphoric idea of simply hooking up cars to the Internet. SAFETY How can the “always on” world contribute to safety? We’re currently perfecting our stereo cameras. Vehicle camera technology has to learn to “see” like a child does. It has to know what a car is, a pedestrian, a building, a street. Our research group in Ulm has been working on this for years, and we’re now the global leader in this field. COMMUNICATION Will vehicle Web connectivity achieve a breakthrough on the road to accident-free driving? Well, it’s like an early warning system. After all, communication among vehicles and between cars and the road infrastructure expands the horizon. For example, today’s vehicle radar units have a maximum range of 300 meters. A networked vehicle increases this range and reduces response times because warnings can be passed on to other cars behind. Secondly, infrastructure can send messages in the form of flashing red lights that warn the driver if he or she is going too fast. Still, there should be a second system in a vehicle to confirm such warnings before a driver takes action. We don’t want the large external network to overrule the onboard network. That’s why our work focuses on internal systems. LIMITS So you’re saying there should be limits to networking. Does that mean some people want to bring online services into vehicles simply because it’s technically possible? I sometimes have my doubts today as to just how much multitasking our brains can take. It’s already bad enough when you’re having an unpleasant phone conversation while you’re driving. Things will get even more complicated when you start incorporating visual input into the vehicle. Technically speaking, there’s practically no limit to the online services you can pack a car with. But what’s the best way for me to respond to a new message when I’m driving? One way is with voice recognition input and output systems (text-to-speech and speech-to-text), DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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provided they are well conceived. Daimler plans to offer complete systems of the highest quality. But all the services we provide will go through our backend system. This will ensure that drivers can retrieve the information with as little distraction as possible. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE Despite the danger of distraction, visualization with displays is here to stay. How will the driver communicate with all of the associated systems and services? Voice-controlled systems will definitely be accompanied by an increasing number of screens and displays until at some point we’ll only have a couple of large monitors in the vehicle. The development of graphic user interfaces is a key issue for us because much of the customer’s experience in the vehicle of the future will be determined by the design of these interfaces. Nevertheless, even after autonomous vehicles have been developed, safety considerations will preclude drivers from sitting back and watching movies — at least for the next 20 or 30 years. ENVIRONMENT Can a networked vehicle ensure a more environmentally friendly driving style? We already have our intelligent Predictive Cruise Control system, which automatically accelerates and shifts in line with road incline or descent. It will also soon be possible to obtain realtime information on traffic volume. Such services will become truly valuable as soon as cars can access data from roadside sensors or process images from traffic cameras. This will be especially true of future electric vehicles, whose drivers will have a better overview of things like the management of charging systems, battery service life, and the remaining vehicle range.

CURRICULUM VITAE +++ Born in 1951 in Chennai, India +++ Bachelor of Technology, with ﬁrst-class honors from the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai (Bombay) +++ Master and PhD (Engineering) with distinction, Universität Karlsruhe +++ Involved with innovations at Daimler for more than 30 years +++ Worked on computer analyses and computer-aided design (CAD) at the Total Quality Management department and eventually became Vice President at Daimler Group Research & Advanced Engineering +++ Head of Product Innovations & Process Technologies at Group Research & Advanced Engineering since April 2009 +++ Honorary Professor at Technische Universität Berlin +++

08.04.11 16:56

METROPOLIS

SHENZHEN Superlative even by China’s standards, the cities of the Pearl River Delta — from Guangzhou to Shenzhen — will soon qualify as the world’s largest metropolitan area.

PARAMETERS SHENZHEN * STATUS: A center of high tech; China’s ﬁrst Special Economic Zone FOUNDED IN: 15th century AREA: 396 km² POPULATION (city): 4 million POPULATION (metropolitan area): 9 million POPULATION DENSITY (city): 10,106 inhabitants/km² WEBSITE: english.sz.gov.cn MONGOLIA

NORTH KOREA Beijing SOUTH KOREA

CHINA

JAPAN Shanghai

SHENZHEN

Bangkok

* SOURCE: Shenzhen Municipal Statistic Bureau

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TAIWAN

PHILIPPINES

MOBILITY Shenzhen, which is situated immediately north of Hong Kong, is one of the fastestgrowing cities in the world. It is facing huge challenges due to the growing mobility needs of the city’s inhabitants and commuters from the surrounding region. Like other major Chinese cities, Shenzhen is therefore increasingly focusing on locally emission-free electric mobility. Daimler is cooperating with BYD, an automobile and battery producer with headquarters in Shenzhen, the “City of Ambitions,” in the area of electric vehicles by setting up a joint research and development facility. The license to produce a joint electric vehicle for the Chinese market has already been granted. The Shenzhen BYD Daimler New Technology Company combines Daimler’s expertise in automotive architectures and safety with BYD’s competence in the areas of battery technologies and electric vehicle systems. ARCHITECTURE In terms of its architecture as well, Shenzhen is literally at the top of the heap. Some examples: • The city’s highest skyscraper to date, the 439-meter-high Kingkey Finance Towers, will be completed in 2012. • The world’s second-highest building, the Pingan International Finance Center, is to be completed by 2015. The planners are considering a height of 648 meters. • A counterpoint to these structures is a “horizontal skyscraper” balancing on eight stilts, which was built in 2009. This gigantic building, which is connected to a public park, is as long as the Empire State Building is high. ECONOMY The construction of a new zone for the service industry is being planned for the coastal district of Qianhai at a cost of 40 billion yuan (almost $6 billion). The zone is expected to generate a business volume of 150 billion yuan and act as an engine to boost the local economy. The decision was a response to the threat of factories relocating to the surrounding countryside. It is hoped that the service industry will bring new prosperity to Shenzhen. T

08.04.11 16:06

A POOL OF IDEAS FOR CITY DWELLERS: INNOVATIONS FROM FOUR MAJOR CITIES.

KAWASAKI This Japanese city of more than a million inhabitants is undergoing a radical transformation, with research and green technologies replacing steel mills and chemical plants.

PARAMETERS KAWASAKI * STATUS: Geographic link between Tokyo and Yokohama FOUNDED IN: 1924 (foundation of the city) AREA: 144.35 km² POPULATION (city): 1.3 million POPULATION (metropolitan area): 34 million POPULATION DENSITY (city): 9,622 inhabitants/km² WEBSITE: city.kawasaki.jp

CHINA Changchun

QUALITY OF LIFE Kawasaki was long known in Japan as an industrial center for metal processing and the electrical industry. But in recent years the local economy has made a radical change of course. Today more than 200 research and development facilities are operating in Kawasaki, and they will be followed by others, including the research laboratory of Nideq, Japan’s largest company for the production of small electric motors. Kawasaki now aims to become the advanced technology capital of the world, with a special focus on environmental technologies and bioengineering. This effort has substantially upgraded the image of this city on the banks of the Tama River and improved the inhabitants’ quality of life. Industrial emissions used to obscure their view of the famous Mt. Fuji, but today this impressive panorama is visible again.

Sapporo

NORTH KOREA

JAPAN Seoul SOUTH KOREA

Tokyo Yokohama

Fukuoka

KAWASAKI

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT One outstanding example of the intense research and development activity in Kawasaki is the Global Hybrid Center at Mitsubishi Fuso Truck and Bus Corporation (MFTBC), which was opened in 2008. It is the central location for the development of hybrid drive systems from Daimler Trucks. More than 1,100 hybrid trucks of the Mitsubishi Fuso Canter Eco Hybrid type have been sold to date, most of them in Japan. Individual vehicles have also been exported. The Global Hybrid Center is an integral part of the Daimler commercial vehicle initiative “Shaping Future Transportation,” whose goals are • to conserve resources by means of efficient drive systems, • to reduce emissions of every kind, and • to minimize the risk of accidents in freight transport by devising new assistance and safety systems.

* SOURCE: Statistics Bureau of Japan, Financial Affairs Department of Kawasaki

DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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08.04.11 16:06

METROPOLIS

VANCOUVER This major Canadian trading hub is one of the cities with the highest quality of life in the world. It is now aiming to be Number One in terms of environmental protection as well.

PARAMETERS VANCOUVER * STATUS: Metropolitan area and trade center of western Canada FOUNDED IN: 1867 to 1886 (as Vancouver)

URBAN DEVELOPMENT Vancouver intends to become the world’s most environmentally friendly city by 2020. A number of projects have already been launched, such as a smart and adaptive LED street lighting system, an integrated energy supply, and ways of simplifying the inhabitants’ access to local green areas. Another one of the city’s top priorities is the introduction and expansion of zero-emission electric mobility in the areas of private vehicles and local public transportation. Vancouver already has the technical know-how that is needed to implement the project. The stacks for fuel cell-powered electric vehicles are being developed here by Automotive Fuel Cell Corporation (AFCC), a joint venture between Daimler, Ford, and Ballard Power Systems.

AREA: 2,878 km² POPULATION (city): 570,000 POPULATION (metropolitan area): 2 million POPULATION DENSITY (city): 5,040 inhabitants/km² WEBSITE: vancouver.ca

CANADA Edmonton Calgary Winnipeg VANCOUVER Seattle USA

Chicago

San Francisco Los Angeles

MEXICO

MOBILITY Vancouver may soon be the first Canadian city to introduce car2go, the innovative mobility concept from Daimler. An initial test run organized in cooperation with public institutions such as the Vancouver Film School and the Vancouver Public Library was already concluded in the fall of 2010. Registered users of car2go were able to rent smart fortwo cars flexibly anywhere in the city, with use charged by the minute. RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT Vancouver intends to become the country’s center of excellence for wireless innovation. In cooperation with 26 Canadian universities, the city has established “Wavehub,” one of five research and development centers for future-oriented areas of technology such as microelectronics, regenerative medicine, medical imaging, and technology for monitoring climate change. The Canadian government is providing the startup capital for this mobile telephony cluster on the Pacific coast. Today Vancouver is already the global development center for fuel cell technology.

* SOURCE: Statistics Canada 2006 Census

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MEXICO CITY Heavy traffic and air pollution have plagued Mexico City for a long time. The city is now setting its sights on new mobility solutions ranging from BRT systems to bikesharing.

PARAMETERS MEXICO CITY * STATUS: Capital of Mexico, world’s third-largest metropolitan area FOUNDED IN: 1521 (as Mexico City)

MOBILITY Three Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) lines have been operating in Mexico City since 2005. The third phase officially commenced operation at the beginning of 2011 and will be joined by a fourth stretch in mid-2011, which will add a further 16 kilometers to the existing approximately 50-kilometer network. According to the city administration, these “Metrobús” lines save about 80,000 tons of CO2 emissions a year. Urban buses from Mercedes-Benz are in daily operation along these routes. The BRT experts at Daimler Buses have also helped to introduce flexible BRT systems, which are characterized by regular-service buses traveling at frequent intervals and short transfer times for passengers, in Nantes (France) and Istanbul (Turkey).

AREA: 1,485 km² POPULATION (city): 8.8 million POPULATION (metropolitan area): 20 million POPULATION DENSITY (city): 5,957 inhabitants/km² WEBSITE: df.gob.mx

Los Angeles

USA

Houston

MEXICO La Paz

Miami Guadalajara Cancún CUBA MEXICO CITY

* SOURCE: Consejo Nacional de Problación, Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung

ARCHITECTURE One of the city’s most renowned young design companies, at103, has won the competition to redesign the Palacio de Lecumberri. This grandiose name stands in contrast to the fact that this building, which was constructed at the end of the 19th century, served until 1976 as a notorious prison. Mexico’s national hero Pancho Villa was one of the prisoners incarcerated here. Since 1982, this rambling brick building has housed the Museum of the National Archives. The old prison architecture, which was based on the “panopticon” principle, will now be broken up and reconstructed to become a networked facility for culture and research. BIKESHARING Although Mexico City has often in the past been in the headlines because of its thick smog and consequent bans on traffic, the city is today the setting of the biggest bikesharing program in North America. The Ecobici program, which is now in its initial phase, encompasses more than 1,100 bicycles and 82 stations where participants can use a chipcard to pick up bicycles and drop them off. Now that this SmartBike program is up and running in an initial four districts of the city, its operator, the U.S. company Clear Channel, intends to expand it to the rest of the city with a total fleet of 6,000 bicycles. DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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08.04.11 16:06

TRANSFER

FUTURE CONCEPT Jürgen HÄPP and journalist Nathalie GILLET discussing the potential of Masdar City.

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08.04.11 16:09

TEXT

PHOTOGRAPHY

Nathalie GILLET

Martin VON DEN DRIESCH

“Masdar City makes us rethink urban design.” Masdar City is an extraordinary urban development project in the United Arab Emirates. The basic idea for this city, which sets out to establish a low-carbon environment, was developed by the British architects Foster + Partners. Project manager Jürgen HÄPP answered some questions while driving to the site near Abu Dhabi. OPEN SPACE Mr. Häpp, what is behind the social utopia of Masdar City? Masdar City is not an unattainable “utopian” development; rather, it is based on the best sustainable principles of high density and short walking distances that can be found in centuries-old, organically grown cities. It sets out to connect historical knowledge with the latest technologies. This mixture ensures that the development is grounded in reality rather than utopia. Masdar City is a real project for real people. In that sense it aims to provide a high-quality urban environment and tries to attract people from a cross section of society. It also aims to integrate with surrounding developments and the greater Abu Dhabi area. Therefore we offer amenities such as recreation areas, which have been located so as to attract residents from Masdar City, as well as people from other parts of Abu Dhabi, especially neighbouring developments. PROCESS Are there any architectural technologies being developed in Masdar City that can already be implemented elsewhere? Yes, of course. However, the focus should not be purely on technology, but also on passive measures that can reduce consumption of energy and natural resources. Therefore the buildings need to be designed in

an integrated manner, which takes into account the local climate and context. Through appropriate orientation, material volumes, and levels of insulation, we can already reduce the energy demand dramatically compared to “business as usual” buildings in the region. As a next step we are using technologies to reduce the demand further or to make more efficient use of energy. Technologies such as heat recovery systems, efficient cooling systems, and building management systems that we used in our first buildings and our pilot project for the “smart electricity grids” with “smart appliances” have applications for other cities as well.

+++ 33 years old +++ has worked in the Masdar (Abu Dhabi) site ofﬁce since 2008 +++ joined the company Foster + Partners in 2007 +++ has worked in various architectural ofﬁces since 2001 +++ Master of Science (M.Sc.) at the University College of London +++ 2004 degree in architecture at the University of Applied Science in Würzburg +++ 1992 apprenticeship as a draftsman at BaurConsult, Haßfurt/Main +++

SUSTAINABILITY What is special about the planning of Masdar City? Masdar City is special in that it enables us to rethink how we approach urban design or city planning. In the 20th century urban planning was very much driven by an engineering approach, rather than the idea of creating urban spaces that can be used and enjoyed by everyone in the city. In this approach, the infrastructure and the streets were very often spaced wide apart to make life easier for planners and to eliminate the necessity for coordination. At Masdar City, we were tasked with looking afresh at cities and how we could make them more sustainable. The connection between and integration of DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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TRANSFER MICROSCOPE MASDAR CITY

Masdar City is an urban development project in Abu Dhabi (UAE). This planned city is being built by Masdar, owned by the government of Abu Dhabi. The city masterplan was designed by British architects Foster + Partners and will rely entirely on renewable energy sources. The city is being constructed

different elements of the city is important. Infrastructure, transport, the buildings, and the public spaces: everything is designed together as an entity. It is concerned with understanding the development of suburban agglomerations since the late 1930s, when a wide-ranging road infrastructure and therefore energy-intensive transportation was planned to meet the demand for individual freedom of mobility. By contrast, a dense and compact city structure was implemented in Masdar City to shorten distances between buidlings, points of interest, etc. The resulting narrow streets have been introduced in order to create a microclimate that, despite the harsh Abu Dhabi climate, invites people to walk or cycle. In addition we want to encourage the use of public transportation or emission-free individual transportation vehicles.

17 kilometers south-east of the city of Abu Dhabi, beside Abu Dhabi International Airport. It will host the headquarters of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

MOBILITY Such as the light railway system? The LRT (light railway system) is very similar to the tram and is currently under development by the Department of Transport of Abu Dhabi. The layer above the LRT is the metro line, which links Masdar City to downtown Abu Dhabi. In order to enhance accessibility we have positioned the underground metro station in the heart of the development. Together, the metro and LRT lines are a crucial part of the sustainable mobility concept, which aims to reduce the reliance on private cars for Masdar City’s residents and commuters. INDIVIDUALITY Another means of transport is Personal Rapid Transit (PRT). How does it work? This is a fully automated vehicle, completely driverless, which is guided on a virtual track. The car follows small magnets in the ground and is centrally controlled. In addition, the car has sensors in the front and in the back which detect obstacles in a lane of traffic and can automatically stop the car if necessary. This very safe technology works like a horizontal elevator. The passenger chooses the destination and the vehicle finds the best and fastest route. With the central control system, such an approach is more efficient than cars driven by individuals.

masdar.ae

7:00 a.m. START at the Foster + Partners Abu Dhabi main ofﬁce.

7:45 a.m. QUICK STOP opposite the Al Bateen Airport.

7:35 a.m. TRAFFIC JAM on the way out of Abu Dhabi city.

7:20 a.m. JÜRGEN HÄPP explains details on the Masdar City map.

7:50 a.m. 68

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STOP for a coffee at Sheikh Zayed Mosque.

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E-MOBILITY There is another pilot project with conventional electric cars. What is the idea behind it? We are exploring how we can introduce these electric cars into the city and what kind of service we can actually offer: car clubs, car sharing schemes or electric taxis. We are also looking into the technology needed for charging and how far we can drive on one battery charge. This is especially important for harsh climates, particularly in summer when a lot of energy is required to run air-conditioning units, thus reducing the range of the car. RENEWABLE ENERGY Do you think we can establish a modern city without using fossil fuels in individual transport systems? Definitely — and as we can already observe, e-mobility is no doubt a major topic for the future. We are coming increasingly closer to reaching this goal. But it is also a question of how much individual transport can be sustained and whether cities can be created and structured in such a way that people have the choice to also use other, public forms of transport in their daily lives. As with the buildings, it is important to use forms of transport that are energy-efficient in order to reduce the overall demand for renewable energy. As you can see, we need to consider the overall system, as electric cars powered by conventional forms of energy are not yet more sustainable.

INTERCONNECTION Can “Masdar City principles” be applied to existing cities? Yes, the core principle of efficient use of resources and energy needs to be applied to all cities. However, the big difference is the timeline. In a new city like Masdar City you can design the infrastructure and buildings in the most sustainable way, as well as using the latest technology right away. In existing cities this will take somewhat longer, as it takes time for buildings and infrastructure to be upgraded to the latest standard. For existing cities it is important to analyse where the big energy demands are and to find mechanisms for improving those with the highest energy demand first. In these analyses cities might actually find that improving the energy efficiency of the infrastructure also makes financial sense, as it reduces operational costs in the long run.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article: daimler-technicity.com/en/haepp including the following features: • BACKGROUND (1) Masdar City: energy-efﬁcient city planning in the Arabic desert (2) Masdar City & Co: more up-to-date projects of British star architects Foster + Partners • VIDEO Welcome to Masdar City: a virtual sightseeing ﬂight • PHOTO GALLERY An architecural photo digest of Masdar City

8:07 a.m. LAST PART of the trip with PRT to the Masdar Institute.

8:10 a.m. FINAL STOP Jürgen HÄPP welcomes journalist Nathalie GILLET in Masdar City.

8:05 a.m. TRAFFIC JAM due to roadside accident.

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Mobility is in our nature. And nature is what drives us. We have a clear objective: to reduce emissions substantially right now and to eliminate them completely in the future. This is why Daimler is developing efficient internal combustion engines and hybrid drive systems as well as locally emission-free electric vehicles powered by the battery or by the fuel cell. For individual mobility, local public transport and goods transport. After all, we invented the automobile â&#x20AC;&#x201C; now weâ&#x20AC;&#x2DC;re shaping its future. Road to emission-free mobility. More information at www.daimler.com

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OPENNESS, TOLERANCE <Eng.> n; -s (abbr. O, T) “TOLERANCE (see p. 72, “The Safety Connection”) doesn’t require one to conceal differences. It requires one to recognize the impossibility of ALL-ENCOMPASSING CONCEPTS (see p. 84, “Green Capital”) and therefore to be aware of unfamiliar and contradictory POINTS OF VIEW (see p. 78, “From the Idea to the Car”).” Lev Zinovevich KOPELEV (*1912 – † 1997), Russian author and scholar of German language and literature.

DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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TEXT

ILLUSTRATION

Andreas KUNKEL

Michael MAYER, Sebastian JUD

THE SAFETY CONNECTIOn They understand each other: Vehicles that coincidentally happen to be at the same place at the same time communicate autonomously with one another and pass on important information. This makes roads safer and improves the quality of life on the move. What may sound like science ﬁction is, in fact, currently being extensively tested in a “car-to-x” communication system.

OMMUNICATION IN REAL TIME “Good morning. A rear-end collision has just occurred on the Brussels beltway, 11 kilometers ahead. Three vehicles are involved in the accident. High traffic volume will lead to the formation of a backup in the next two minutes. May I suggest an alternative route that currently has fewer vehicles?” The driver to whom this notification regarding the R0 highway near Brussels is addressed receives the message in real time, as it originated from the vehicles involved in the accident. The information is sent to cars at a further distance away to notify drivers of a possible traffic jam, and vehicles in the vicinity that are moving toward the accident are also provided with additional information, which is shown on the displays to warn drivers that there is a danger of a rear-end collision. Depending on how dangerous the situation is, the vehicles will also sound acoustic alarms, while at the same time forwarding the accident data they’ve received to emergency medical services and the police. Traffic control centers also benefit from this new form of communication. Instead of the 20 minutes 72

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it previously took to register and analyze an incident on the Brussels beltway and then to pass the associated data on to drivers, the center now has at its disposal near-realtime data and more detailed information. Brussels currently holds the dubious distinction of being the “Trafﬁc Jam Capital of Europe,” ahead of such heavily congested cities as Paris, London, and Warsaw. However, the number of rear-end collisions and trafﬁc jams will probably decline substantially over the next 15 years. That’s because vehicles in the future will immediately register obstacles and dangerous situations on any road, even at great distances, and will then make the necessary information available to drivers. They will do this by “talking” to one another with the help of state-of-the-art wireless technologies. The engineers who developed this form of technical communication refer to it as “car-to-x.” Car-to-x systems enable a vehicle to exchange information with other cars and with stationary roadside devices. The use of a so-called multi-hop feature, which functions somewhat like a relay race, even makes it possible to send the data over long distances.

“Car-to-x communication will create numerous new opportunities to supplement the vehicle sensors that are already being used, so as to make new driving comfort and safety features possible,” says Ralf Guido Herrtwich, Director of Driver Assistance and Chassis Systems at Daimler Group Research and Advanced Engineering. Herrtwich is certain that the technology is set to undergo rapid development, resulting in a vehicle whose numerous sensors will give it “sensory organs,” and whose onboard electronic systems will make it more and more “intelligent” — even to the extent that it might one day be able to anticipate events. Such a vehicle will adjust to the traffic situation several kilometers down the road. Its precise knowledge of how such situations develop will make it possible for its “mobility intelligence” to look into the future in order to prepare for potential risks or circumvent a traffic jam that hasn’t even formed yet. This would also take engineers a theoretical step further toward the vision of an optional “autopilot” that allows drivers to benefit from the knowledge of the current situation that has been gained by the cars ahead and then adapt their driving behavior accordingly.

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PARAMETERS A TESTING AREA IN THE HEART OF GERMANY

Bad Nauheim

Bad Homburg vor der Höhe

Bad Vilbel

Eschborn Offenbach a. M. FRANKFURT A. M. Main

The simTD consortium chose an area around Frankfurt am Main as the ideal location to test car-to-x communication systems under real-life conditions. • Major highway (autobahn) marked in purple: Autobahn segment with high-density trafﬁc registration and ITS Roadside Stations. Marked in light purple: Connections to the autobahn network with ITS Roadside Stations. • Secondary highways marked in orange: The B3 and B 455 highways, including connections to the A5 autobahn. • Streets marked in yellow: Inner-city streets with high-density trafﬁc registration and ITS Roadside Stations.

WARNING SIGNALS An emergency services vehicle on a congested street autonomously transmits a radio signal that announces its presence to other vehicles, which can then quickly get out of its way.

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// If the system is to be accepted, it s crucial that the driver s privacy remains protected. // Christian WEISS Group Research and Advanced Engineering at Daimler

In their effort to equip vehicles with this type of “communicative intelligence,” most of the German automakers have teamed up with system developers, communication companies, research institutes, and universities to demonstrate the feasibility and future viability of the concept in a program coordinated by Daimler. This melting pot of automotive innovators is currently attempting to make its vision of future vehicles a reality in a project known as “Safe and Intelligent Mobility — Test Field Germany” (simTD). Along with Daimler, the project participants include Audi, BMW, Ford, Opel, Volkswagen, Bosch, Continental, Deutsche Telekom, the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft, the German Research Center for Artiﬁcial Intelligence, the technical universities (TUs) of Berlin and Munich, the Saarland University of Applied Sciences, and the University of Würzburg. As part of the simTD project, this work has also received support from the German Ministries of Economics and Technology (BMWi), Education and Research (BMBF), and Transport, Building and Urban Development (BMVBS). The German state of Hesse, meanwhile, has made its streets and roads available to simTD. It is also a member of the project consortium, as is the city of Frankfurt am Main and the Hesse Department of Transportation. The project borrows heavily from concepts developed by the Car-to-Car Communication Consortium that was established by the European automotive industry to promote the development of car-to-x communication systems. In the middle of the year 2011 the project members will begin venturing into new territory by demonstrating the basic functionality of car-to-x technology within a test area of approximately 300 square kilometers

(about the size of Malta) in and around Frankfurt. A fleet of about 400 cars will perform a field test that anticipates the future of automobile communication on highways, streets, and other roads. Among other things, the testing will focus on the real-time exchange of information on dangerous situations, such as those caused by vehicles that have broken down on roadways. “Even after features like the ones we’re examining become market-ready a few years down the road, the potential offered by these communication technologies will still be far from exhausted,” says Herrtwich. On the contrary, “I expect simTD to not only test and demonstrate the feasibility of the planned functions but also to generate new ideas as we proceed.” In other words, simTD will serve as the pilot project for further trials around the globe. The key aspect here involves achieving additional safety improvements. The Daimler engineers are using the company’s four-pillar philosophy of integrated safety as the basis of their work. The innovations related to “prevention” and “reaction” are designed to ensure maximum active safety, and the innovations for “protection” and “rescue” are meant to guarantee maximum passive safety. “Our goal is ‘Vision Zero’ as formulated by the European Commission,” says Herrtwich, adding by way of explanation that the purpose of simTD is to make a vital contribution to reducing the number of traffic accident victims to almost zero. A simple example of the edge in safety that an autonomously communicating vehicle will have is its ability to “see around corners.” In the future, such a car will utilize information from vehicles ahead that have already passed the area behind the curve. For example, if a disabled vehicle is perceived, a broken-down vehicle warning will be shown on the display

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// Even after features become DIALOGUE Ralf Guido HERRTWICH Director of Driver Assistance and Chassis Systems at Daimler Group Research and Advanced Engineering

market-ready the potential offered by these communication technologies will be far from exhausted. // Ralf Guido HERRTWICH Director of Driver Assistance and Chassis Systems at Daimler Group

What significance does the simTD project hold for the further development of vehicles in the future? With simTD we are taking a third and decisive step in our effort to effectively expand the “sensory systems” of vehicles. Our first step was to use data about vehicle status and driver reactions in order to teach cars to “feel” (PRE-SAFE ®). After that, vehicles learned to “see” with the help of radar sensors and cameras. This made it possible to develop emergency braking systems such as PRE-SAFE ® Brake. Now we’re on the threshold of teaching vehicles to communicate, which will enable them to share their current “observations” in just a fraction of a second. So for us, simTD marks the next logical step in the further development of our safety systems. The point is not to replace existing vehicle sensors with communication units but instead to close the functional gaps that still remain today. Car-to-x communication will become a global standard in the future. Why has the consortium decided to limit its trials to the region around the city of Frankfurt? Frankfurt represents the culmination point where a large number of European research projects come together and are being tested under real-life conditions. The results will influence many follow-up projects in Europe, the United States, and Asia, and Daimler will be involved in these projects either directly or indirectly. Some of the functions in car-to-x systems will initially focus on achieving further improvements to vehicle safety. Daimler has repeatedly played a pioneering role in safety innovations in the past. One of the reasons why simTD is important to us is that it offers a firm foundation for successfully continuing this tradition.

Research and Advanced Engineering

of a car traveling several hundred meters behind. If the driver fails to react, the warning will begin to flash and will later be supplemented by an acoustic alarm, even as the same information is passed on to other cars that are approaching the scene. In line with the Daimler philosophy, the system will only intervene in the vehicle’s operation if other system sensors have determined that an accident has become unavoidable and that the driver is no longer in control of the situation. This level of plausibility is commonly used in the automotive industry for safety applications. To ensure that functions such as these will work safely and reliably, simTD engineers had to address a whole range of technical issues prior to the major field test. One such issue involves the problem of integrating wireless technology into vehicle control devices and determining the best place to mount the radio antennas. However, the most important aspect is to ensure the rapid transmission of data among vehicles and to traffic guidance and control centers. This also includes making sure a “temporarily not available” message will never be issued due to a network overload. One way of achieving this is to utilize a procedure that prevents a “broadcast storm” of vehicles passing on the same information in the event of a traffic jam, for example. “In general, it’s more than enough for just a fraction of the cars to reliably forward information,” says simTD project manager Christian Weiss from Group Research and Advanced Engineering at Daimler. Data security must also be guaranteed, which is why simTD utilizes an integrated security architecture approach for car-to-x communication, whose objective is to guarantee both data security and confidentiality. “If the system is to be accepted, it’s crucial that the driver’s privacy remains protected,” Weiss explains. One example of such protection involves having the vehicle regularly alter its communication pseudonym. 75

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Engineers in the simTD project are currently working on a list containing more than 20 functions that are representative of a future car-to-x system. Along with “local danger alerts” for obstacles on the road, traffic jams, severe weather conditions, and police and emergency vehicle activity, these include a general “traffic situation report,” optimized “traffic flow control,” and new assistance systems that enable not only the recognition of traffic light sequences but also the early detection of “messages” emitted by digital traffic signs and warnings concerning traffic in intersections. In order to further improve the flow of traffic on local streets and secondary roads, vehicles will also “maintain good contact” with traffic lights, which will, for example, enable them to know when the next light will switch from red to green and vice versa. The interior display will then show a small traffic light symbol before the light is reached. The onboard computer system can compare the data it receives on the traffic light sequences with the vehicle’s current speed and information about the traffic situation that has been obtained via car-to-car communication. This allows the system to determine which color the light will be when the car arrives and then switch the traffic light symbol to that color. Obviously, the same collection of data can be used to issue speed recommendations concerning features such as green waves that enable the driver to make optimal progress along the road.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article:

daimler-technicity.com/en/sim-td including the following features: • INTERVIEW Ilja RADUSCH, Head of Automotive Services and Communication Technologies at the Fraunhofer Institute in Berlin, talks about intelligent car-to-x communication systems • VIDEO See how simTD situations are simulated with computers • BACKGROUND Developing a uniform radio communication standard was one of the biggest challenges for the simTD project

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simTD TEST CENTER ITS Vehicle Station

Observation data

ITS Vehicle Station

ITS Roadside Station

The simTD Test Center for data Trafﬁc light

processing, control, and data storage systems is being set up

Data on the surrounding area Trafﬁc data

in parallel with activities in the Car-to-car communication

Car-to-infrastructure communication

State registration ofﬁce

testing area.

Trafﬁc message channel (TMC)

simTD Test Center

Hesse Trafﬁc Center (VZH)

Variable message trafﬁc sign

Integrated Trafﬁc Management Center, Frankfurt am Main (IGLZ)

Police

Service providers

DANGER WARNING A vehicle that “recognizes” a dangerous location on the road transmits this information to numerous other road users in the surrounding area — even around corners.

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PHOTOGRAPHY Joel Micah MILLER

From the Idea to the Car THE NEW CONCEPT FOR THE A-CLASS, The concept car Daimler developed under the title “Concept A-Class” unites A-Class and B-Class features and marks the start of a new era in automotive architecture.

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FOR THE PAST 125 YEARS ideas have been turned into automotive applications. These ideas are generated by people who transform their passion and know-how into reliable, comfortable, and safe products each and every day. One of these products is the new Mercedes-Benz Concept A-Class, which celebrated its worldwide public debut at Auto Shanghai in spring 2011.

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THE TEAM BEHIND THE CONCEPT A-CLASS (from left to right): Udo PREUSS, Interior Engineering • Alexander BORGHAMMER, Assembly Ofﬁcer Concept A-Class • Andreas FRANK, Design • Peter LEHMANN, Head of the Engineering and Realization of Overall Vehicles department • Jens VELTE, Operating Concept (Switches) • Volker MEYER, team leader for auto show vehicles • Dieter MAIER, Assembly Ofﬁcer, Workshops and Electricians

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THE CONCEPT A-CLASS includes a high-tech interface with the Internet and the following online features: 7-inch color display, operated via the COMAND Controller • iPhone functions integrated into the head unit • Visualization on the display via software applications (apps), operation via the COMAND Controller • iPhone can be placed into a compartment in the center console, where it is automatically synchronized with the head unit TECHNICAL HIGHLIGHTS 7-speed dual-clutch transmission • Radar-based collision warning system with adaptive Brake Assist • High-performance LED headlights • Intelligent Light System Length: 4,280 mm • Width: 1,780 mm • Height: 1,430 mm • Trunk: 350 liters • Wheelbase: 2,700 mm

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CONTROLS Instrument panel and center console:

MATERIAL Use of metallized leather (semi-anilline

COLORS Titanium and silver tones in the interior

a complex structure of brushed aluminum.

with metallic pigments).

combined with beige plus accentuation in red.

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TEXT

PHOTOGRAPHY

Susanne SCHÄFER

Roderick AICHINGER

“Learning from the best” is the slogan of the European Green Capital initiative. The aim is to take as models those European cities that combine an appealing urban lifestyle with sustainability and green mobility. That’s why the European Commission is selecting two European cities every two years, starting in 2010, as “Green Capitals”. Each of the winning cities will bear the coveted title for one year.

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Reykjavík

Oslo

Stockholm 2010

Malmö Copenhagen

Hamburg 2011

Amsterdam

Bristol

EUROPE’S ENVIRONMENTALLY Münster

FRIENDLY CITIES The jury selected 14 cities, ranging from Nuremberg

Freiburg

Reykjavík in the north to Barcelona in the south, from the numerous applicants for the European Green Capital Award.

Nantes 2013

Vitoria-Gasteiz 2012

Barcelona

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Out and about in Hamburg — Green Capital 2011

reen Capitals — a global task “We’re trying to not only place the economy on a foundation of intelligent, sustainable, and integrated growth but also more efﬁciently use the limited resources available on our planet,” says Janez Poto nik, European Commissioner for the Environment. The key, he adds, is to solve the problems created by urbanization processes while exploiting the associated opportunities and potential. Several cities in Europe are on their way to mastering these tremendous challenges, according to the EU: The ﬁnalists for the Green Capital Awards for 2010 and 2011 were Amsterdam, Bristol, Copenhagen, Freiburg, Hamburg, Münster, Oslo, and Stockholm. A total of 35 European cities applied for the Green Capital designation. The Swedish capital Stockholm won the award in 2010, and Hamburg has now followed as the new European Green Capital.

HafenCity on the bank of the River Elbe, 6:30 a.m. An urban district awakens. Many of the first people who took up residence in Hamburg’s HafenCity (harbor city) are walking toward the downtown area. After just a few steps, they hear a mixture of a tenor singing, a violin concerto, and the metallic sounds of an experimental orchestra. The music is coming from large earpiece-shaped speakers arranged around a container at a pavilion that offers passersby a taste of things to come when the Elbphilharmonie — the Hamburg Philharmonic Hall — is completed. From this location, HafenCity residents have a panoramic view of the Sandtorhafen piers and the yachts and launches anchored there. Numerous bridges cross canals here and lead to the center of the city. The innovatively designed HafenCity in Hamburg already shows today what the major metropolises of the future will look like. These will be made up of districts where buildings, residential areas, streets, bicycle paths, and footpaths complement one another — locations where urban flair and environmentally friendly mobility set the pace of life. The pedestrian paths in HafenCity are two-and-a-half times as long as the length of road available to motor vehicles. The focus of mobility is very much on public transport systems based on buses and subways, whose networks are continually being upgraded and expanded. This year, HafenCity will also receive its first stateof-the-art fuel cell buses. Europe’s biggest hydrogen filling station is also being built here. The facility will begin supplying Mercedes-Benz Citaro fuel cell buses in mid-2011 and will be run up to full capacity (hydrogen for 20 buses per day) by 2013. The filling station is part of the Clean Energy Partnership (CEP) — an initiative that also includes Daimler and the Hamburger Hochbahn AG transport company. The objective is to establish a full-coverage hydrogen infrastructure between Hamburg and Berlin. HafenCity is by no means the only project that’s improving sustainability in Hamburg. The city has developed an ambitious “Master Plan” for other districts as well: One goal is to reduce CO2 emissions in Hamburg by 40 percent from 1990 levels (approximately 20 million tonnes) by 2020, and by 80 percent by 2050. Among other things, this will require modernizing old buildings and expanding the public transport network, in particular the subway system. This approach isn’t so surprising when you consider that in 2008 around 46 percent of all CO2 emissions in Hamburg were produced by households and small businesses, 30 percent were generated by industry, and 24 percent by traffic and transport. Hamburg also plans to increase the number of bicycles available for rent in the city and build more bike lanes to encourage people to cycle. Also being considered is the establishment of a special environmental zone in Hamburg and a congestion charge for cars such as the one introduced in London a few years ago. The environmental zone would require drivers entering to have an emission certificate on their vehicles, as is already the case in Berlin and London. Hamburg has already made excellent progress as far as environmental protection is concerned: CO2 emissions declined by 16.4 percent to 17.3 million tonnes between 1990 and 2008, as was reported by the city-state’s Ministry of Urban Development and Environmental Protection in November 2010. Most recently, Hamburg was named European Green Capital 2011 by the European Commission in recognition of its pioneering

GREEN CAPITAL — THE ASSESSMENT CRITERIA The winning and ﬁnalist cities for the European Green Capital Award display exemplary attributes in one or more of the following ten areas: • Local contribution to global climate change • Local transport • Green urban areas • Sustainable land use • Nature and biodiversity • Quality of local ambient air • Noise pollution • Waste production and management • Water consumption • Waste water treatment • Environmental management of the municipality

The winners for the next two years have also already been determined: The Spanish city of Vitoria-Gasteiz will hold the title in 2012, followed by Nantes, France, in 2013. Barcelona, Malmö, Nuremberg, and Reykjavík made the short list. “All of these cities have something in common: a good balance between transport systems, land utilization, and planned use of open spaces,” says Poto nik. All the ﬁnalists also stand out through the fact that “they are pioneers in environmentally friendly urban living and can serve as a role model for sustainable urban development around the world.” Nantes, Barcelona, and Hamburg are extremely impressive examples of how to promote green mobility. Among other things, all three cities have succeeded in persuading more and more residents to use public transportation. The presentation of the Green Capital Awards in Europe is part of a global trend of honoring large and small cities for outstanding achievements when it comes to sustainability and environmental protection. Be it the Financial Times’ “Sustainable Cities Award,” the “Australian Sustainable Cities Awards,” or the “Globe Awards” (which monitor urban development activities around the world) — in each case, the award judges consider an extensive range of factors relevant to sustainability.

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efforts in the areas of green mobility, energy, and urban planning. “European cities all face similar challenges and can learn from one another,” says Hamburg’s former Senator for the Environment, Anja Hajduk. “As European Green Capital 2011, Hamburg will promote such an exchange of ideas. We are a key industrial center and have the third-largest port in Europe, which means we face special challenges related to environmental protection. We now have both the opportunity and an obligation to effectively reconcile the needs of ecology and business.” Hamburg needs innovative concepts to achieve its far-reaching goals for urban planning and, above all, mobility. These concepts are being provided not only by the city itself but also by citizens and private urban planners.

30 vehicles for European transport companies; ten of them are destined for Hamburg. Hamburger Hochbahn AG will also begin taking delivery of 20 Mercedes-Benz B-Class F-CELL (fuel cell) passenger cars this year. All of this is bringing Hamburg a major step closer to its objectives of reducing emissions, creating a more sustainable city, and further improving quality of life. Hamburg thus fully deserves its status as Green Capital 2011, especially given that the city is preparing another revolution in urban mobility. Since spring of 2011, Hamburg residents are able to hop into cars anywhere around town, drive off, and park for free with the car2go system, which was launched in cooperation with the Europcar rental company. car2go, a mobility concept developed by Daimler, includes 300 smart fortwo models equipped with a solar roof in a special

“A good balance between transport systems, land utilization, and planned use of open spaces.” Janez POTO NIK, European Commissioner for the Environment Ottensen, western Hamburg, 11 a.m. Even on a Tuesday, there’s a lot going on at this time of day in Ottensen, a district located west of HafenCity. Freelancers and students are hunched over laptops in cafés, getting their hair cut at one of the many hairdressers in the area, or shopping at a Turkish vegetable stand. Mone Böcker is here for professional reasons. She looks out at Bahrenfelder Straße and says, “The sidewalks are much too narrow, parked cars are blocking everything, and cyclists can barely get through. Streets like these aren’t fulﬁlling their function as places where people can linger.” Böcker, an economist, is a managing partner at the “raum + prozess kooperative planung und stadtentwicklung” urban planning company and a promoter of street space design in line with the principle of shared space. Her goal is to ensure equal rights for drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians on shared streets so as to make the urban environment more multifunctional and more attractively designed. Wandsbek Markt subway station in eastern Hamburg, 2 p.m. Passengers coming from subway Line 9 get on a bus. But residents and pedestrians hardly hear anything when the bus takes off because the vehicle’s electric motors barely make a sound. The Hamburger Hochbahn transit company is now the owner of two Mercedes-Benz Citaro G BlueTec Hybrid buses that it is testing in normal service operations. The Citaro model is the only hybrid bus in existence today that can travel for stretches solely on electric power without using its diesel engine. Some of the electricity is obtained from braking energy. If necessary, some can be produced via a generator driven by the bus’ diesel engine. The two diesel-hybrid buses are evidence of another key Hamburg goal: promoting electric mobility as a means of reducing CO2 emissions. Hamburger Hochbahn AG will also begin trials with new Mercedes-Benz Citaro FuelCELL Hybrid buses in 2011. Fuel cell buses from Daimler were already used successfully in the city from 2003 to 2010 — much longer than originally planned. Now, the next generation of such buses is going into service, and the new fuel cell hybrid is as environmentally friendly as you can get. The bus generates no pollutant emissions and is practically noiseless, which makes the Mercedes-Benz Citaro FuelCELL Hybrid ideal for congested cities. Daimler Buses is building around

“smart car2go edition.” Daimler’s innovative car-sharing concept has already proved itself in two cities: Ulm, Germany (since October 2008) and Austin, Texas (since November 2009). “car2go in Hamburg allows us to expand our range of services to include a forwardlooking component,” says Philippe Guillemot, CEO of the Europcar International Group. “We’ve been offering individual mobility solutions for decades and have always anticipated changes in mobility behavior at a very early stage. Together with Daimler, we’re now creating solutions for future urban transport requirements. And by doing so, we’re able to attract new target groups.” Schanzenviertel, north of HafenCity, 8 p.m. After dinner, a young architect who doesn’t own her own car suddenly decides that she wants to drive home. Thanks to car2go, she can. Using a cell phone, smartphone, or computer, she can ﬁnd a nearby vehicle via the Internet, which she can reserve at an attractive price based on minutes of use. There is no contract, no basic service fee, and no minimum rental period. The vehicle usage fee is processed by a telematics unit in the car. When she gets home, she simply parks the car. There’s nothing left for her to do — no topping off at the gas station, no vehicle checks, no obligations whatsoever. car2go, new bike paths and pedestrian zones, an environmentally friendly vehicle ﬂeet from Daimler, and an intelligent public transport network — all these things are moving Hamburg toward a green future that the city will be able to sustain long after the EU’s Green Capital Award has been presented to its successors.

HYPERLINK Further information related to this article: daimler-technicity.com/en/green-capital including the following features: • INTERVIEW (1) Günter ELSTE, Chairman of Hamburger Hochbahn AG (2) Eric CHEVALIER, Director of Transportation, Nantes (3) Dídac PESTAÑA RODRIGUEZ, Vice President of TMB Barcelona • VIDEO The ﬁnalists in the European Green Capital Award competition • BACKGROUND Green role models: The European Green Capital Award

DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

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Mr. Elste, what is your long-term objective concerning green mobility in Hamburg?

“We want the public transport system to be completely free of fossil fuel sources by 2030.” Günter ELSTE, Chairman of Hamburger Hochbahn AG

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European Green Capital

Winner 2011

Ambitious environmental strategy: Each year, the number of bus and subway trips made in Hamburg increases by 10 million. By 2015, the target is 500 million passenger trips per year. By then, CO2 emissions are to be reduced by 40 percent compared with 1990 levels. Population: 1.8 million Population density: 2,362 inhabitants/km2 Transport mode breakdown: Public 19%, passenger cars 41%, bicycle/pedestrian 40% BRT system: Metrobus, since 2001, 22 lines Bikesharing system: StadtRAD, 72 stations, approx. 1,100 bicycles Parking garages: 26 in the inner city Public parking spaces: 10,000 Subway system: 189 million passengers per year

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To the airport Two fuel cell aircraft tractors operated at Hamburg Airport from 2008 to 2010, when the associated pilot project was successfully completed.

Hydrogen ﬁlling station Europe’s largest hydrogen ﬁlling station is being built in Hamburg’s HafenCity. Mercedes-Benz Citaro FuelCELL Hybrid buses operated by Hamburger Hochbahn AG are among the vehicles that will begin refueling here in mid-2011. • Plans call for an initial 520 kg of hydrogen to be made available per day • A bus can travel some 450 km on one tank of hydrogen • 780 kg of hydrogen will be made available daily by 2013

A7 highway covering Construction of Germany’s largest highway enclosure begins in 2011. When completed, the A7 autobahn will be covered for around 3,500 meters between Othmarschen and Schnelsen.

P P

P H

HafenCity University

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Elbphilharmonie

H U

U Science Center

HafenCity StadtRAD Hamburg Hamburg’s StadtRAD bicycle rental system began equipping all 72 of its rental stations with state-of-the-art wireless technology in February 2011. • The bike rental system was established in 2009 • A total of 75,000 people now use it today • The system recorded its one-millionth bike rental in November 2010

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Sustainable mobility along the Elbe River car2go car2go, the innovative mobility concept from Daimler, came to Hamburg in April 2011, making the metropolis on the River Elbe the second German city to introduce the system, after Ulm. • A total of 300 vehicles will initially be made available • car2go users can register for the service at six Europcar stations • All of the rental smarts are equipped with a solar roof

Hamburger Hochbahn AG Hamburger Hochbahn AG is the secondlargest local public transport company in Germany: • 401 million passengers per year • Over one million passengers per day • 3 subway lines, 114 bus lines • Mercedes-Benz Citaro fuel cell buses have been in operation since 2006

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raum + prozess raum + prozess is cooperating with the public sector on strategies and projects that help to promote sustainable urban development in Hamburg.

hySOLUTIONS hySOLUTIONS GmbH, established in 2005, promotes the use of fuel cells and hydrogen in Hamburg. Projects completed through 2011: • The European-wide HyFLEET:CUTE project with six Mercedes-Benz Citaro fuel cell buses in Hamburg • Zemships: Fuel cell ship on the Alster • Fuel cell aircraft tractors at Hamburg Airport

Parking garage

Bike lane/guard bar

Street bike lane

Electric recharging station

Pedestrian path — bicycles permitted/ joint pedestrian-bike path

Bicycle accommodation via ramps and promenades

Elbe River bike path

Multi-mode trafﬁc

car2go station

Subway stop

StadtRAD station

Bus stop

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Mr. Pestaña Rodríguez, how can cities like Barcelona improve the attractiveness of their public transport systems even further?

“When it comes to attractive public transport, comfort, safety, and cleanliness are just as important as speed.” Dídac PESTAÑA RODRÍGUEZ, Execute Vice President (CEO) of Transportes Metropolitanos de Barcelona (TMB)

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European Green Capital

Finalist 2012 /2013

Attractive local public transport system: Over the last ďŹ ve years, Barcelona has increased the capacity of its urban bus system by around 45 percent and that of its subway by 36 percent. One-third of its residents opt for public transport every day. Population: 1.6 million, (+3.6%, 2000â&#x20AC;&#x201C;2008) Population density: 15,970 inhabitants/km2 Transport mode breakdown: Public 32%, passenger cars 15%, bicycle/pedestrian 52% BRT system: Retbus, since 2011, 3 lines Bikesharing system: Bicing, 401 stations, approx. 6,000 bicycles Parking garages: 50 Public parking spaces: approx. 54,000 Subway system: 405 million passengers per year

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Mr. Chevalier, what types of urban mobility challenges and opportunities are medium-sized cities like Nantes addressing today?

â&#x20AC;&#x153;We must make it possible for citizens to choose the best mobility solution for their needs from various options.â&#x20AC;? Eric CHEVALIER, Director of Transportation, Metropolregion, Nantes

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European Green Capital

Winner 2013

Innovative transport solutions: The development of a sustainable public transport network — including a new “Bus Rapid Transit” system — has enabled Nantes to cut the volume of inner-city trafﬁc by about 50 percent. Population: 283,000 Population density: 4,342 inhabitants/km2 Transport mode breakdown (metropolitan region): Public 15%, passenger cars 57% (-4.6%, 2002–2008), bicycle/pedestrian 28% BRT system: BusWay, since 2006, one line with 15 stops Bikesharing system: Bicloo, 89 stations, approx. 800 bicycles Parking garages: 13 Public parking spaces: approx. 6,000 Trips on public buses: approx. 30 million per year

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DIGITAL FEATURES You can ﬁnd background information, videos, photo galleries, and much more about the themes covered in this issue at: www.daimler-technicity.com

DIGITAL NETWORKS

ENDURANCE RESEARCH

CHALLENGE TOP FIT How innovative technologies can be used to get the best out of people who specialize in endurance. daimler-technicity.com/en/topﬁt-truck

ALWAYS ON How the networked world is opening up previously undreamed-of possibilities for individuals, technology, and society at large, and the challenges it poses. daimler-technicity.com/en/always-on

URBAN DEVELOPMENT

HIGH-TECH COMMUNICATIONS

SAFETY STRATEGY

THE SAFETY CONNECTION How vehicles that

DRIVING SIMULATOR How the simulator enables

communicate with one another help to improve

test drivers to put new vehicle technologies through

the safety of all road users.

their paces in extreme virtual situations.

daimler-technicity.com/en/sim-td

daimler-technicity.com/en/driving-simulator

TOMORROW’S AUTOMOBILE

models of sustainable urban development

CONCEPT CAR

and green mobility.

FROM THE IDEA TO THE CAR How a automobile concept is turned into reality.

daimler-technicity.com/en/green-capital

daimler-technicity.com/en/concept-a

GREEN CAPITAL How cities are becoming

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IMPRINT AND CONTACT PUBLISHER Daimler AG, Communications, Stuttgart, Germany For the publisher: Mirjam Bendak Publication manager DAIMLER TECHNICITY: Matthias Steybe Online presence DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM: Maximilian Schmitz Marketing and customer contact: Sandra Wagner International sales: Uwe Haspel

ONLINE SPECIALS These and related articles do not appear in the printed magazine; however, they are available as regular digital updates at: www.daimler-technicity.com

EDITING AND DESIGN Creative director: Wolfram Schäffer Project management: Susanne Wacker Editor in chief: Matthias Straub Online editor: Kai-Holger Eisele Editorial team: Miriam Bauer, Anna Gallecker, Evghenia Hamminger, Stefan Häusler, Anastassia Kudina, Franziska von Stieglitz Authors: Rüdiger Abele, Martin Fritz, Nathalie Gillet, Steffan Heuer, Andreas Kunkel, Martin Schäfer, Susanne Schäfer, Peter Thomas Proofreader: Andrew Leslie Art director: Helmut Kirsten Layout: Pia Bardesono, Diana Müller, Ioannis Karanasios, Isabel Winter Photography: Roderick Aichinger, Gert Albrecht (illustration), Martin von den Driesch, Stefan Hohloch, Sebastian Jud (illustration), Frank Kaiser, Michael Meyer (illustration), Joel Micah Miller, Berthold Steinhilber Translation: TransForm GmbH, Cologne, Germany

VIDEO DIARY

PRODUCTION AND SALES Editing and design: design hoch drei GmbH & Co. KG, Stuttgart, Germany Reprographics: Dr. Cantz’sche Druckerei GmbH & Co. KG, Ostfildern, Germany Printing: Stark Druck GmbH & Co. KG, Pforzheim, Germany Sales: Zenit Pressevertrieb GmbH, Stuttgart, Germany

F-CELL WORLD DRIVE How three Mercedes-Benz B-Class F-CELL cars are demonstrating fuel cell technology’s suitability for everyday use in a trip around the world. daimler-technicity.com/en/fuelcellworlddrive

VIDEO MAGAZINE

NEWS CHANNEL

Innovation news online International trend scouts and science journalists report on the latest developments in the areas of mobility, technology, and innovation.

WEEKLY WEB CHECK

Recommended link of the week Exciting photo galleries, innovative microsites, and updated websites dealing with science, business, technology, and design.

ECO-TREK The weekly video magazine about green and future-oriented trends from all over the world.

CONTACT AND READER SERVICE Zenit Pressevertrieb GmbH, Postfach 81 05 80, 70522 Stuttgart, Germany Tel.: +49 711 7252-268 Fax: +49 711 7252-399 e-mail: readerservice@daimler-technicity.com Online: www.zenit-presse.de Daimler AG, Communications, 70546 Stuttgart, Germany Fax: +49 711 17-790-95251 e-mail: contact@daimler-technicity.com Online: www.daimler-technicity.com/contact ADVERTISING Advertising manager: Marzena Schneider, design hoch drei GmbH & Co. KG, Glockenstraße 36, 70376 Stuttgart, Germany Tel.: +49 711 55037730 Fax: +49 711 55037755 e-mail: marzena.schneider@design-hoch-drei.de Online: www.design-hoch-drei.de Media data: www.daimler-technicity.com/en/mediakits PICTURE CREDITS P. 20/22 Fotolia, P. 21 diginfo.tv, P. 23 Recon Instruments Inc., P. 23 NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org, P. 25 Alcatel-Lucent, P. 51 Maciej Noskowski/Getty Images, P. 53 Fotolia, P. 55 Mlenny Photography/Getty Images, P. 58 Fotolia, P. 62 © Imaginechina/Corbis, P. 62 © BOBBY YIP/ Reuters/Corbis, P. 63 Norikazu Katsui/Getty Images, P. 64 © Beau Lark/Corbis, P. 65 © Karl Fjellstrom/transportphoto.net, P. 65 © Nik Wheeler/CORBIS, P. 68 Masdar, P. 68/69 Google maps, P. 88 Vattenfall/© — dilight.com, P. 88 DB AG/Ralph Winn, P. 88/89 Google maps, P. 89 Hamburger Hochbahn AG COPYRIGHT Reproduction and use, including excerpts, only with the express written authorization of Daimler AG. No liability will be accepted for unsolicited submissions of texts and/or images. Reports with bylines do not necessarily represent the opinion of the publisher or the editorial team. No liability is assumed in respect of information regarding appointments and equipment. Binding information and prices are contained in the respectively valid official sales information from Daimler AG. All other information in this publication is also provided to the best of our knowledge and belief, but without any liability.

CONCEPT DESIGN

TECHNICITY appears twice a year in German and English editions. Number 1, Year 2, 2011 ISSN: 2190-0523 © Daimler AG 2011 DAIMLER-TECHNICITY.COM

DESIGN HYBRID 2035 The future of the automobile: A concept design from

A publication of Daimler AG

Mercedes-Benz. daimler-technicity.com/en/design-hybrid

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MAGAZINE FOR INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

ISSUE 01 2011

TECHNICITY MAGAZINE FOR INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

TECHNICITY

ALWAYS ON The networked world now extends to individual mobility — and opens up previously undreamed-of possibilities. TECHNICITY

110330_T_Cover_RZ_E_AL.indd 1

FOR ISSN 2190-0523

PHOTO: FRANK KAYSER PHOTOGRAPHY

MAGAZINE

URBAN COMPETITION

HIGH-PERFORMANCE ENGINES

How major cities in the EU are evolving thanks to new concepts for sustainability and mobility.

How boosting efﬁciency to the maximum leads to top engine performance.

CAR-TO-X COMMUNICATION

FITNESS MANAGEMENT

Why communication between vehicles will transform the future of mobility.

How innovative technologies help athletes and truck drivers improve their performance.

INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY MOBILITY

ISSUE 01 2011

6.50 9.00 10.00 6.00 60.50

EUR USD CHF GBP CNY

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08.04.11 17:31