NHTSA wants to know more about Tesla's Robotaxis plans

Tesla announced that it has already launched its early-access Robotaxi service in San Francisco Bay Area and Austin, Texas. The Robotaxis are regular Model Ys, for now, and they come with a safety driver. The cars run on a still-unreleased version of the FSD software.

Shortly after the post was published, NHTSA sent out some questions to Tesla in order to get a sense of how the company plans to implement the new tech and Robotaxis. For instance, how the Full-Self Driving system handles poor weather conditions such as "sun glare, fog, airborne dust, rain and snow". After all, we've seen some concerned engineers talk about the issues that may arise with using only cameras for the ADAS and without LiDAR.

NHTSA is also asking about the specific hardware and software that Tesla is going to use for its Robotaxis, how the company monitors disengagements of the self-driving system, and how often that occurs. Additionally, how emergency situations will be handled.

The early-access program is only available to Tesla employees for now, and the company says it has completed over 1,500 trips and 15,000 miles so far.

If we had to guess, we don't see Robotaxis being available for the wider public very soon, as FSD is still rated as Level 2 ADAS. To be considered fully autonomous, it has to meet Level 3 standards, which seems to be taking quite a bit of time.

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