An assessment was performed on the potential macroeconomic impacts resulting from the adoption of higher-level automated driving systems (ADS) on the long-haul trucking industry. The analysis simulated the macroeconomic effects of the introduction of automation in the long-haul trucking sector in the United States using USAGE-Hwy model. The simulation introduced productivity shocks to the trucking sector from labor costs savings, fuel cost savings, capital cost savings, and safety improvements that are expected from automation. The simulations also considered the upfront cost of acquiring the technology by examining three time profiles for the adoption of automation: slow, medium, and fast adoption paths.

1. Fast scenario: 75 percent of new vehicle purchases involve ADS in 10 years of the technology becoming available.
2. Medium scenario: 48 percent of trucking firms will have begun adopting 10 years after the technology becomes available.
3. Slow scenario: 19 percent of trucking firms will have begun adopting 10 years after the technology becomes available.

Cost of Adopting Truck Automation

The cost of adopting automation in long-haul trucking was estimated based on the cost of replacing the current fleet of long-haul trucks with a fleet of trucks fitted with the technology to allow for automated operation (e.g. lidar, sensors and other technology). In this study, the per-truck cost for adopting automation technology was estimated to cost approximately $100,000 per truck, with the expectation that this unit cost would fall over time as the technology adoption rates.

Figures 1 and 2 reflect the extra investment expenditure in for-hire and in-house industries at baseline prices. With baseline investment in the For-Hire industry projected to reach $203 billion by Year 30 (2050), the estimated cost of adopting automation in the For-Hire sector reaches almost 2.5 percent above baseline (approximately at $208 billion).