Weather Data Collection from Fleet Vehicles
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current vehicle information systems primarily focus on position tracking and management, neglecting the potential for collecting and processing weather-related data from road-going vehicles, which limits the utilization of rich data collection opportunities.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a method to report weather-related data from road-going vehicles to a weather-determining system, where the data is processed to obtain statistically reliable weather information, leveraging existing vehicle sensor data and communication links without the need for additional sensors, and providing feedback or on-demand weather information to vehicles and consumers.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If vehicle information systems focus on position tracking and management, then position monitoring capability is improved, but weather data collection capability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies multi-functionality by enabling existing vehicle information systems to perform both position tracking and weather data collection. The system processes multiple types of data (position, temperature, precipitation, humidity, wind) through a unified communication and processing architecture, allowing the same infrastructure to serve multiple purposes without requiring separate dedicated systems for each function.
2Adaptability or versatility
If dedicated weather-sensing equipment is added to vehicles, then weather data collection capability is improved, but system complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent reuses existing vehicle sensors and communication infrastructure for weather data collection, avoiding the need for dedicated weather-sensing equipment. The same sensors used for vehicle operation monitoring are leveraged to collect weather parameters, and the existing communication links used for position reporting are utilized to transmit weather data, thereby maintaining low system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses the vehicle's own existing infrastructure (sensors, communication systems, processing units) to collect and transmit weather data, rather than requiring external or dedicated weather monitoring equipment. The vehicle information system serves itself by processing multiple data types including weather parameters through its already-deployed architecture.
3Reliability
If weather data is collected from multiple vehicles, then weather information reliability is improved, but data processing complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges weather data from multiple vehicles with position tracking data and other vehicle information into a unified processing framework. The centralized server aggregates and processes all data types together, using the same communication infrastructure and processing algorithms to handle both position and weather information, thereby reducing overall processing complexity compared to separate dedicated systems.
Data Source
AI summary
In one embodiment taught herein, a plurality of road-going vehicles report weather-related data to a weather-determining system. For example, trucks and/or cars having in-vehicle information systems wirelessly transmit one or more items of weather-related data, such that the weather-determining system directly or indirectly receives the transmitted data. In turn, the weather-determining system jointly processes the weather-related data to determine weather information for one or more geographic areas corresponding to reported positions of the road-going vehicles. In one embodiment, the in-vehicle information systems comprise GPS-based position reporting systems installed in on-highway trucks and other fleet vehicles, and the weather-determining system comprises a modified position-tracking system, e.g., a modified network fleet management system. Weather-related data may be collected and processed for large numbers of vehicles across many geographic areas of interest, and the resulting weather information can be fed back to the road-going vehicles and/or provided to other consumers of weather information.