Engineers will drive future auto technologies, General Motors says

By Ann Steffora Mutschler, Senior Editor -- Electronic News, 6/5/2007

New automotive technologies will cause a paradigm shift and the associated design challenges will create opportunities for the electrical and electronic engineering industry to play a part in the design of new electrical and electronics based architectures, systems, and software for cars and trucks. That’s according to Lawrence D. Burns, VP of R&D and strategic planning for General Motors Corp., who presented a keynote at the Design Automation Conference in San Diego, Calif., on Monday.

“120 years ago, Carl Benz drove the first car out of the barn and it was energized by petroleum, powered by an internal combustion engine, and steered mechanically. And today, nearly 120 years later, almost all cars and trucks have that same basic genetic makeup. We think it’s time that that’s going to change in a big way,” Burns said.

“We see the internal combustion engine being replaced by electric propulsion that ties together electric motors, fuel cells and battery, creating and storing electricity on board the vehicle,” he explained. “We see petroleum being replaced by electricity and hydrogen. Now, electricity and hydrogen don’t exist alone in nature -- they have to be generated -- but their beauty is they can come from so many different pathways, versus today, the auto industry being 98 percent dependent on petroleum.”

Further, Burns noted, “We see mechanical systems being replaced by electrical and electronic systems. … And we see vehicles transitioning from being pretty much standalone where you are managing the controls of the vehicle to vehicles being connected to everything around them. We literally have an opportunity to reinvent the automobile around these exciting technologies.”

To prove this is technology is real and is happening now, GM created “Sequel,” a zero emission automobile, powered by hydrogen fuel cell technology that runs for 300 miles per “fill-up.”

The technology is being integrated into 100 Chevrolet Equinox vehicles, which will be test marketed beginning at the end of this year, and through next year.

“Energy technology and technology options are the key behind General Motors’ strategy going forward. We simply have to find a way to displace petroleum used by automobiles. The auto industry is 98 percent dependent on petroleum -- that’s not a good position to be in from a business standpoint,” Burns said. “Displace petroleum through energy diversity.”

Of course there are a number of challenges facing the auto industry, and Burns said GM has set goals that include, from an energy standpoint, seeing the industry get to low cost, renewable energy. Then, from an emissions standpoint, GM wants to take the automobile totally out of the environmental debate. And from a safety standpoint, GM wants to create vehicles that do not crash, and from a congestion standpoint, get to a place of congestion-free routing -- all of these at an affordable price point, he said.

Burns further gave examples of electronic stability control, anti-lock braking, telematics, navigation and safety systems technologies, and noted that much of the development of these technologies was done in a math-based environment -- similar to high level electronic systems design.

He concluded with a request for help: “We really do have the opportunity to create a new DNA for an automobile and that’s a very exciting future. … This isn’t being done just out of the goodness of our heart. This is being done for business reasons. There is an enormous opportunity to accelerate the growth of the auto industry. … We need [the engineering community] to help us realize this.”