Even though car manufacturers spend millions on the development of technology to make petrol engines quieter and electric vehicles near silent, both types of vehicle look set to become louder.
European safety laws requiring mandatory artificial soundtracks for otherwise near-silent electric vehicles may result in cars that sing songs, chirrup like a bird or even make the thumping noise of a pod racer from Star Wars. And Porsche sports cars of the future could get away with being almost four times noisier than regular cars, while high-performance versions of the BMW 3 series, Audi A4 and Mini Cooper could become almost twice as loud under German plans for weak international limits on vehicle noise.
The German proposal, which has been influenced by the German car and lorry industry, will be presented next week at the working group on noise of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) in Geneva The European Commission is expected to publish its own proposal on noise emissions from cars, vans, lorries and buses later this month. According to the European transport lobby group, T&E, It is likely that Germany will also try to weaken those proposals in order to gain concessions for its car industry.
Noise can be dangerous to health
Close to half of all Europeans are regularly exposed to traffic noise levels that are potentially dangerous to health and transport noise is linked to 50,000 fatal heart attacks every year, so it may seem perverse that the prospect of truly quiet cars looks likely to prompt laws forcing electric cars to make some kind of sound. However, the near silence of these vehicles at speeds under 20mph is thought to put pedestrians and cyclists at risk.
As a result, all the major electric car manufacturers are developing artificial sounds for their vehicles. Ford is running a poll on Facebook to choose the sound for its forthcoming electric Focus and Nissan has said it is investigating the option of its electric cars emitting white noise, electronic sounds or something it describes as ‘Star Wars noise’.
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