European Parliament Makes ESP Systems Mandatory in EU from 2011

All new passenger-car and commercial-vehicles models registered in the European Union from November 2011 will have to be equipped with an electronic stability program (ESP) as standard, the European Parliament has announced. According to the new regulation that has still to be finally adopted by the Council of Ministers, ESP will be mandatory to all new vehicles sold within the EU from November 2014.

"ESP can prevent up to 80 percent of all skid-related accidents," said Dr. Werner Struth, president of the Chassis Systems Control division at Bosch, summarizing the results of international studies. "After the seat belt, the system is therefore the most important safety technology in the car."

The decision to make the installation of ESP mandatory is part of a comprehensive package of measures that the European Union plans to implement in order to increase road safety and reduce fuel consumption.

Besides ESP, the EU intends to make predictive emergency braking and lane departure warning systems mandatory for commercial vehicles with a gross weight of more than 3.5 tons and for minivans and buses with more than eight seats from November 2013 (new model) and November 2015 (new registrations).