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If driverless trucking takes off, why would the gas station need to be full service (staffed with humans)? Compared to building an autonomous truck, autonomous

If driverless trucking takes off, why would the gas station need to be full service (staffed with humans)? Compared to building an autonomous truck, autonomous refueling seems like the easy part.

zardo 10y ago
Far fewer units to move and a much longer expected life on the hardware. Hiring a fuel filler is an easy retrofit.
- freehunter 10y ago
  It would also likely be prudent to have a human visually inspecting the trucks and able to perform small maintenance tasks. My car can tell me the tire pressure is low, but it can't change the tire. It can tell me the backup sensor is obscured, but it can't clean it. Maybe it didn't even notice it hit something/something hit it (like a fast, low flying bird) and now the fender is hanging off. Things that might need to be done in between distribution centers that would be easier for a human to check, at least in the short term.
  - jsprogrammer 10y ago
    Trucks would be standardized and have sensors to detect many types of damage and the truck could be rerouted to an automated repair facility (or perhaps a repair vehicle would be dispatched). Visual inspection could be done better automatically. Automation that relies on humans to minimally function is garbage.
    - freehunter 10y ago
      There will always be humans overseeing automation for the foreseeable future. At least until we figure out what all will/can go wrong. There are humans supervising automation in factories and warehouses, just in case. It's simply a good idea until we have AI as smart and observant as a human.
  - sdenton4 10y ago
    Yeah, my guess is we'll see convoys of automated trucks first, with one operator for each line of five or ten trucks. In part for small upkeep and correction in real time, in part to increase the risks of straight up highway robbery... If you can blow out an automated truck's tires and know it will take a day for a repair vehicle to show up, you might as well go for it...
infogulch 10y ago
Think of it this way: Right now, to move one trucks' worth of cargo for one hour requires one man hour. i.e.: 1 man-hour per cargo-hour. If you have a single human that full-services 200 self-driving trucks in one day, you have: 1 man-hour per 200 cargo-hours. Sure, autonomous refueling is easier than self-driving, but self-driving trucks also makes the human relatively way cheaper to employ.
- Bartweiss 10y ago
  My thoughts exactly. The usual standard for automation, I believe, is 18-24 months salary - if the capital cost can be recouped in two years automation is worthwhile. For hundreds of well-paid truckers that's a relatively generous target, but automating a reliable gas pumping system just to save on one minimum-wage gas pumper looks like a much lower ROI.
  - Pica_soO 10y ago
    The factor is availability- you need three of these workers for a around the clock shift. AI does not sleep.
    - infogulch 10y ago
      Ok, so you have 3 employees working 24/7 for an average of a $20k salary (33% more than minimum wage). That's $60k/year or $120k over 24 months (based on Bartweiss' ROI estimation). Do you think it's possible to deliver an automated gas pump that services 4,800 trucks per day (~1 truck every 3 minutes) for $120k? I don't.
      - napoleond 10y ago
        Eventually I think it could happen. It simply requires economies of scale--the hardware is not the expensive part of an automated gas pump.
        Pica_soO 10y ago
Shivetya 10y ago
Until the automate the process of inspection and refueling it would be a good job to place people. Treat it like an airplane coming in from a flight. Support crew go out to verify the condition the truck thinks its in, fix minor things the truck called out, and refuel it. Sign off on the paperwork stating truck meets all acceptable Federal and State laws.
- Bartweiss 10y ago
  This is definitely part of it - humans are great at flexible-requirement tasks. Gas the truck, kick the tires, squeegee off the sensors, make sure nothing is obviously falling apart. Rather than paying one human per truck, you pay one human per ~200 trucks to do all of the minor, unpredictable service tasks needed.
justanotherbody 10y ago
By this logic should we have autonomous refueling already? After factoring in the cost of the robotics I suspect paying humans minimum wage is quite a bit cheaper. Especially given the diverse outdoor environments such a system would need to be maintained in
- Animats 10y ago
  By this logic should we have autonomous refueling already? It's been done a few times.[1][2] The systems are rather slow and clunky, but work. Dealing with all the variation between cars runs up the cost. Tesla has a charging robot.[3] This is much easier, since Tesla controls both sides of the interface. The car actively cooperates, opening the charging port door. Tesla also interlocks the car so that you can't drive away while plugged in. I'm surprised that Tesla hasn't deployed those robot chargers yet. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y_J7fg03fA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y_J7fg03fA [2] http://mashable.com/2014/01/29/robotic-gas-pump/#hDxoRZBZ5Zqu http://mashable.com/2014/01/29/robotic-gas-pump/#hDxoRZBZ5Zq... [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMM0lRfX6YI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMM0lRfX6YI
  - icebraining 10y ago
    They did deploy one station, between SF and LA. They say it has barely got any traffic, so they aren't planning to build any more. Others have pointed out that building the station was a requirement to get some CA tax benefit.
- unclebucknasty 10y ago
  Not really. There's not a lot of value in autonomous refueling when everything else about vehicle operation is manual.
- gambiting 10y ago
  There is no value in automated refueling - almost everywhere in the world drivers re-fuel their cars themselves, so there is no money to be saved by making this process automated. The only exception to this are some american states where you can't do it yourself by law.
Robotenomics 10y ago
By 2050 gas stations will disappear to be replaced by electric charging stations which will be automated.

If driverless trucking takes off, why would the gas station need to be full service (staffed with humans)? Compared to building an autonomous truck, autonomous refueling seems like the easy part.

zardo 10y ago

Far fewer units to move and a much longer expected life on the hardware. Hiring a fuel filler is an easy retrofit.

freehunter 10y ago
It would also likely be prudent to have a human visually inspecting the trucks and able to perform small maintenance tasks. My car can tell me the tire pressure is low, but it can't change the tire. It can tell me the backup sensor is obscured, but it can't clean it. Maybe it didn't even notice it hit something/something hit it (like a fast, low flying bird) and now the fender is hanging off. Things that might need to be done in between distribution centers that would be easier for a human to check, at least in the short term.
- jsprogrammer 10y ago
  Trucks would be standardized and have sensors to detect many types of damage and the truck could be rerouted to an automated repair facility (or perhaps a repair vehicle would be dispatched). Visual inspection could be done better automatically. Automation that relies on humans to minimally function is garbage.
  - freehunter 10y ago
    There will always be humans overseeing automation for the foreseeable future. At least until we figure out what all will/can go wrong. There are humans supervising automation in factories and warehouses, just in case. It's simply a good idea until we have AI as smart and observant as a human.
- sdenton4 10y ago
  Yeah, my guess is we'll see convoys of automated trucks first, with one operator for each line of five or ten trucks. In part for small upkeep and correction in real time, in part to increase the risks of straight up highway robbery... If you can blow out an automated truck's tires and know it will take a day for a repair vehicle to show up, you might as well go for it...

infogulch 10y ago

Think of it this way: Right now, to move one trucks' worth of cargo for one hour requires one man hour. i.e.: 1 man-hour per cargo-hour. If you have a single human that full-services 200 self-driving trucks in one day, you have: 1 man-hour per 200 cargo-hours. Sure, autonomous refueling is easier than self-driving, but self-driving trucks also makes the human relatively way cheaper to employ.

Bartweiss 10y ago
My thoughts exactly. The usual standard for automation, I believe, is 18-24 months salary - if the capital cost can be recouped in two years automation is worthwhile. For hundreds of well-paid truckers that's a relatively generous target, but automating a reliable gas pumping system just to save on one minimum-wage gas pumper looks like a much lower ROI.
- Pica_soO 10y ago
  The factor is availability- you need three of these workers for a around the clock shift. AI does not sleep.
  - infogulch 10y ago
    Ok, so you have 3 employees working 24/7 for an average of a $20k salary (33% more than minimum wage). That's $60k/year or $120k over 24 months (based on Bartweiss' ROI estimation). Do you think it's possible to deliver an automated gas pump that services 4,800 trucks per day (~1 truck every 3 minutes) for $120k? I don't.
    - napoleond 10y ago
      Eventually I think it could happen. It simply requires economies of scale--the hardware is not the expensive part of an automated gas pump.
      - Pica_soO 10y ago

Shivetya 10y ago

Until the automate the process of inspection and refueling it would be a good job to place people. Treat it like an airplane coming in from a flight. Support crew go out to verify the condition the truck thinks its in, fix minor things the truck called out, and refuel it. Sign off on the paperwork stating truck meets all acceptable Federal and State laws.

Bartweiss 10y ago
This is definitely part of it - humans are great at flexible-requirement tasks. Gas the truck, kick the tires, squeegee off the sensors, make sure nothing is obviously falling apart. Rather than paying one human per truck, you pay one human per ~200 trucks to do all of the minor, unpredictable service tasks needed.

justanotherbody 10y ago

By this logic should we have autonomous refueling already? After factoring in the cost of the robotics I suspect paying humans minimum wage is quite a bit cheaper. Especially given the diverse outdoor environments such a system would need to be maintained in

Animats 10y ago
By this logic should we have autonomous refueling already? It's been done a few times.[1][2] The systems are rather slow and clunky, but work. Dealing with all the variation between cars runs up the cost. Tesla has a charging robot.[3] This is much easier, since Tesla controls both sides of the interface. The car actively cooperates, opening the charging port door. Tesla also interlocks the car so that you can't drive away while plugged in. I'm surprised that Tesla hasn't deployed those robot chargers yet. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y_J7fg03fA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y_J7fg03fA [2] http://mashable.com/2014/01/29/robotic-gas-pump/#hDxoRZBZ5Zqu http://mashable.com/2014/01/29/robotic-gas-pump/#hDxoRZBZ5Zq... [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMM0lRfX6YI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMM0lRfX6YI
- icebraining 10y ago
  They did deploy one station, between SF and LA. They say it has barely got any traffic, so they aren't planning to build any more. Others have pointed out that building the station was a requirement to get some CA tax benefit.
unclebucknasty 10y ago
Not really. There's not a lot of value in autonomous refueling when everything else about vehicle operation is manual.
gambiting 10y ago
There is no value in automated refueling - almost everywhere in the world drivers re-fuel their cars themselves, so there is no money to be saved by making this process automated. The only exception to this are some american states where you can't do it yourself by law.

Robotenomics 10y ago

By 2050 gas stations will disappear to be replaced by electric charging stations which will be automated.