Search Results for: cars

By Monica Dobie

University World News here again features a selection of commercially important and cutting edge higher education research developments.

*Researchers from the Max Planck Institute, Germany, have developed a genetic tool that can help speed the development of new genetic varieties of food crops.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN Union (EU) institutions and national governments must take a proactive role to publicise the usefulness and availability of intelligent transport systems, to boost demand and ultimately lower costs, members of the European Parliament say.

Its transport committee has backed a detailed report warning that despite the sophistication and proven worth in safety terms of in-vehicle intelligent systems, European "penetration rates remain very low in relation to their potential."…

By Monica Dobie

University researchers helped develop the air bag – a vehicle safety device that has saved hundreds of thousands of lives – but now they have created a prototype that protects drivers and passengers, just before a collision occurs.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) research project involving major automobile manufacturers has created a system that protects vans and cars from collisions with other vehicles, including lorries, just before a crash. The EU Euro 29 million Advanced Protection Systems (APROSYS) project system automatically boosts the side-protection strength of cars threatened with such accidents, protecting them from impacts.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

PORTUGUESE auto workers who recently lost their jobs in layoffs are to receive Euro 2.42 million from the European Union (EU) in social assistance and retraining packages. The money will come from the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund, designed to help Europe cope with economic change brought by worldwide economic change.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) passenger road transport sector is set for constant expansion until 2030, according to a new detailed report written for the European Commission. It predicts that 2005’s EU passenger numbers by private (and fleet) cars and motorcycles of 4,714 gpkm (one billion passengers carried over one kilometre) will rise to 5,115 by 2010; 5,498 in 2015; 5,849 in 2020; 6,171 in 2025; and 6,441 by 2030.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN Union (EU) ministers have been asked to swiftly approve a comprehensive trade agreement between the EU and Bosnia & Herzegovina which will phase out duties on EU-made cars, automotive components and fuel exported to Bosnia. The move follows approval of long awaited Bosnian policing reforms which had blocked the deal.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission is formally threatening Malta with legal action at the European Court of Justice alleging its registration tax system illegally overcharges secondhand vehicles. A minimum tax rate applies for used cars, and not new cars. Because many secondhand vehicles are imported from other European Union member states, Brussels considers this an illegal trade barrier.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) is pushing ahead with the approval of a new compulsory regulation that will insist cars and vans sold in Europe have new ‘brake assist’ systems and also meet detailed and tough requirements on frontal protection systems.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE GERMAN newspaper Handelsblatt has quoted European Union (EU) environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas accepting large car model manufacturers may enjoy lower CO2 reduction targets than companies making smaller cars. Dimas had resisted this idea – looking for more equal contributions to the EU target of 120 grammes per kilometre by 2012.…