Periodic Reporting for period 1 - PoDIUM (PDI connectivity and cooperation enablers building trust and sustainability for CCAM)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2022-10-01 do 2024-03-31
Cooperative, Connected and Automated Mobility (CCAM) is not only a key to achieving the EU’s Vision Zero, but also to enhance the availability of mobility services for everyone. The implementation of such Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) for road traffic, especially regarding cooperative behavior, relies on seamless communication, generally known as vehicle-to-anything (V2X) communication.
Overall, such a CCAM system requires advanced Physical and Digital Infrastructure (PDI), where the physical part comprises of classical road infrastructure like traffic signs or traffic lights as well as, e.g. communication networks and computation capabilities, and the road users themselves. Examples for the digital part are digital maps together with digitally processable descriptions of the traffic rules as well as the data collected, processed, and communicated by the road users and the infrastructure.
The PoDIUM project, funded by the EU within its Horizon Europe program, addresses the need of such PDI enhancements by developing and realizing five CCAM use cases (UCs) in three living labs (LLs) in Germany, Italy and Spain in real traffic conditions. PoDIUM will tackle all the different requirements for availability and performance of connectivity as well as the different cooperation enablers per UC. The proposed UCs aim to advance a set of key technologies both in the physical and digital part of the infrastructure. In particular, the following non-exhaustive list of objectives will be pursued:
• A multi-connectivity approach to ensure reliability, availability and redundancy of the PDI system.
• Advance data fusion and integration of Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) to the proposed hybrid data management environment to enable enhanced environment perception models towards digital twins.
• New C-ITS messages for enabling the specific advanced CCAM use cases.
• Ensure software integrity, trust and truthfulness of CCAM data, their exchange and their processing.
• Demonstration of urban and highway use cases in a diverse set of configurations with integration of Vulnerable Road Users (VRU).
Overall, such a CCAM system requires advanced Physical and Digital Infrastructure (PDI), where the physical part comprises of classical road infrastructure like traffic signs or traffic lights as well as, e.g. communication networks and computation capabilities, and the road users themselves. Examples for the digital part are digital maps together with digitally processable descriptions of the traffic rules as well as the data collected, processed, and communicated by the road users and the infrastructure.
The PoDIUM project, funded by the EU within its Horizon Europe program, addresses the need of such PDI enhancements by developing and realizing five CCAM use cases (UCs) in three living labs (LLs) in Germany, Italy and Spain in real traffic conditions. PoDIUM will tackle all the different requirements for availability and performance of connectivity as well as the different cooperation enablers per UC. The proposed UCs aim to advance a set of key technologies both in the physical and digital part of the infrastructure. In particular, the following non-exhaustive list of objectives will be pursued:
• A multi-connectivity approach to ensure reliability, availability and redundancy of the PDI system.
• Advance data fusion and integration of Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) to the proposed hybrid data management environment to enable enhanced environment perception models towards digital twins.
• New C-ITS messages for enabling the specific advanced CCAM use cases.
• Ensure software integrity, trust and truthfulness of CCAM data, their exchange and their processing.
• Demonstration of urban and highway use cases in a diverse set of configurations with integration of Vulnerable Road Users (VRU).
The PoDIUM consortium has developed a generic PDI architecture that, is backward compatible with previous connected infrastructure architectures regarding the respective use cases realized there. Besides, the PoDIUM architecture incorporates certain PDI enhancements that enable the realization of the new CCAM UCs, ensuring interoperability. A bottom-up approach to derive the architecture was chosen, by first deriving the following sub-views of the overall architecture:
• communication view,
• functional view,
• data flow and storage view,
• Information Technology (IT) environment view,
• software integrity and data truthfulness view.
Each of the views facilitates respective experts to easily understand the design and needs of this architecture and to derive an implementation for a specific use case. Due to the common architecture, the implementations remain interoperable, e.g. with respect to data interfaces using standardized C-ITS messages.
From the detailed views, an overall high-level view, as shown in the Figure, was derived to highlight the main contributions that PoDIUM will provide on a technical level across all LLs and UCs. The complete set of road entities is supported, namely RSUs, sensors connected to the system, and connected Traffic Lights (omitted from figure for simplicity). Besides, all types of road users are considered and supported, namely legacy (non-connected) vehicles and other non-connected road users; connected VRUs with a cellular User Equipment (UE); Connected conventional Vehicles (CV), connected Emergency Vehicles (EV) and Connected Automated Vehicles (CAV) with an On-Board Unit (OBU).
The platform services can be either hosted on a MEC server or on the central cloud, determined mainly by their latency requirements. A diverse set of communication technologies is considered and will be evaluated, including multiconnectivity. To ensure the integrity of the software and exchanged CCAM data, a trusted computing approach is developed on Trusted Platform Modules (TPMs). Many services depend on the DT, which fuses incoming information from different sources (e.g. C-ITS messages and infrastructure sensor data) into an enhanced environmental model. Thus, the reliability of the DT data and, in consequence, of its sources is crucial. To reinforce this aspect, the PoDIUM architecture includes trust building and data truthfulness evaluation of data sources.
Starting from the common architecture, the details needed for the implementation of each UC were specified. The necessary PDI enhancements were identified and are under development, indicatively:
• Multi-connectivity via a scheduler and a transparent p4 programmable software switch
• a general approach to check the data truthfulness before the data is incorporated in the digital twin
• UC-specific functional components such as digital twins, collision risk detectors, ITS message handling, manoeuvre planning, cooperative awareness, traffic management, the operation of emergency vehicles, and cross-border handling
• Software integrity: a measure of how safe, secure, and reliable the software is. It impemented via a Remote Attestor, the entity responsible for challenging and verifying the trustworthiness of a remote device referred to be a Trusted Computing Base.
CCAM involves a number of actors/roles cross-collaborating in the value chain. These actors/roles include not only traditional roles like vehicle manufacturers and road infrastructure operators but also actors/roles from other industries – ICT etc. Many actors/players are entering the market following different approaches, either collaborating or competing with traditional actors/players. In this context, the market potential of PoDIUM developments and CCAM in general has been analysed. A PoDIUM reference model has been derived and market analysis has been performed based on inputs from partners and CCAM experts (online questionnaire).
We have analyzed the resulting ecosystem, i.e. we identified all the involved actors and roles, their relationships and revenue streams.
Finally, the project achievements have been disseminated in the form of publications or standards contributions and hence PoDIUM has become a well-known “brand name”.
• communication view,
• functional view,
• data flow and storage view,
• Information Technology (IT) environment view,
• software integrity and data truthfulness view.
Each of the views facilitates respective experts to easily understand the design and needs of this architecture and to derive an implementation for a specific use case. Due to the common architecture, the implementations remain interoperable, e.g. with respect to data interfaces using standardized C-ITS messages.
From the detailed views, an overall high-level view, as shown in the Figure, was derived to highlight the main contributions that PoDIUM will provide on a technical level across all LLs and UCs. The complete set of road entities is supported, namely RSUs, sensors connected to the system, and connected Traffic Lights (omitted from figure for simplicity). Besides, all types of road users are considered and supported, namely legacy (non-connected) vehicles and other non-connected road users; connected VRUs with a cellular User Equipment (UE); Connected conventional Vehicles (CV), connected Emergency Vehicles (EV) and Connected Automated Vehicles (CAV) with an On-Board Unit (OBU).
The platform services can be either hosted on a MEC server or on the central cloud, determined mainly by their latency requirements. A diverse set of communication technologies is considered and will be evaluated, including multiconnectivity. To ensure the integrity of the software and exchanged CCAM data, a trusted computing approach is developed on Trusted Platform Modules (TPMs). Many services depend on the DT, which fuses incoming information from different sources (e.g. C-ITS messages and infrastructure sensor data) into an enhanced environmental model. Thus, the reliability of the DT data and, in consequence, of its sources is crucial. To reinforce this aspect, the PoDIUM architecture includes trust building and data truthfulness evaluation of data sources.
Starting from the common architecture, the details needed for the implementation of each UC were specified. The necessary PDI enhancements were identified and are under development, indicatively:
• Multi-connectivity via a scheduler and a transparent p4 programmable software switch
• a general approach to check the data truthfulness before the data is incorporated in the digital twin
• UC-specific functional components such as digital twins, collision risk detectors, ITS message handling, manoeuvre planning, cooperative awareness, traffic management, the operation of emergency vehicles, and cross-border handling
• Software integrity: a measure of how safe, secure, and reliable the software is. It impemented via a Remote Attestor, the entity responsible for challenging and verifying the trustworthiness of a remote device referred to be a Trusted Computing Base.
CCAM involves a number of actors/roles cross-collaborating in the value chain. These actors/roles include not only traditional roles like vehicle manufacturers and road infrastructure operators but also actors/roles from other industries – ICT etc. Many actors/players are entering the market following different approaches, either collaborating or competing with traditional actors/players. In this context, the market potential of PoDIUM developments and CCAM in general has been analysed. A PoDIUM reference model has been derived and market analysis has been performed based on inputs from partners and CCAM experts (online questionnaire).
We have analyzed the resulting ecosystem, i.e. we identified all the involved actors and roles, their relationships and revenue streams.
Finally, the project achievements have been disseminated in the form of publications or standards contributions and hence PoDIUM has become a well-known “brand name”.
PoDIUM strives to showcase the capabilities of the envisioned ITS that advances the state of the art by providing
• multi-connectivity to optimally utilize the available communication channels, for enhanced reliability and reduced latency;
• a distributed environment for data storage between the local computing entities, the edge and the cloud levels;
• an IT environment allowing for a flexible service deployment between these three levels;
• methods to ensure software integrity and assess data trustworthiness; and
• relevant services for CCAM integrating also non-connected vehicles and vulnerable road users (VRUs).
These technical innovations aim towards an increased safety of road traffic in general and especially for VRUs. PoDIUM aims also at increasing the traffic efficiency and, thus, reducing the carbon footprint of road traffic. PoDIUM will pursue tangible impact to the respective domains by providing input to respective standardization bodies from real-world experience with such a CCAM system, and developing new business models and market services in the field of ITS.
• multi-connectivity to optimally utilize the available communication channels, for enhanced reliability and reduced latency;
• a distributed environment for data storage between the local computing entities, the edge and the cloud levels;
• an IT environment allowing for a flexible service deployment between these three levels;
• methods to ensure software integrity and assess data trustworthiness; and
• relevant services for CCAM integrating also non-connected vehicles and vulnerable road users (VRUs).
These technical innovations aim towards an increased safety of road traffic in general and especially for VRUs. PoDIUM aims also at increasing the traffic efficiency and, thus, reducing the carbon footprint of road traffic. PoDIUM will pursue tangible impact to the respective domains by providing input to respective standardization bodies from real-world experience with such a CCAM system, and developing new business models and market services in the field of ITS.