Developing Advanced Car Navigation Systems
Eco-driving Support
It is well-known that a traffic jam encourages inefficient gas consumption. A report from the Japanese Ministry of Environment says that ten minutes idling consumes 130-140 cc gas. Alpine's car navigation systems find routes that avoid traffic jams and guide drivers smoothly to their destinations within the shortest possible time. This contributes to reduced fuel consumption due to inefficient driving and reduced CO2 emissions due to prolonged idling in congested traffic. As research is underway on even more advanced systems that can avoid traffic jams through linkage with public infrastructure systems, car navigation systems are expected to play an even greater role. Through the development of advanced car navigation systems, Alpine wants to help reduce the environmental impact of automobiles.
In addition to avoiding traffic jams, Alpine's systems boast a variety of functions that support eco-driving: displaying automobile fuel control data, as well as monitoring and rating the way the driver uses the accelerator. The system will issue warnings against sudden acceleration/deceleration. Sudden acceleration/deceleration not only lowers fuel efficiency, but is also believed to be primarily responsible for the generation of CO2, which is thought to be a cause of global warming.
Alpine will remain committed to the development of products that are friendly to the environment.
Making the Navigation unit itself more ecological
Making on-board electronics lighter and more energy efficient in order to reduce environmental impact is an important challenge. In our new navigation systems we have migrated from HDD to flash memory as our storage medium and improved display quality while switching to an LED backlight. In doing so we have achieved weight reduction and increased energy efficiency.
Continuing to achieve environmentally friendly products
After Market Product Development Department Manager
Yasuyuki Goto
Our X08 car navigation system for the Japanese market, which has received much acclaim, uses an energy efficient LED backlight and was made without using mercury. This year, the same strategy is being implemented in North America and Europe. Additionally, changing from HDD to memory will save size, weight and electricity. We will be offering these products in Europe and Japan during this year. Development for the U.S. has already started.
We previously launched “mech-less” audio players with no moving parts that play digital audio. We will continue to plan and develop products with the environment in mind.
