Unrealistic claims surrounding self-driving cars have been slammed as “overly aggressive” and “unhelpful” at an Asia-Pacific conference surrounding future vehicles.

Grandiose statements of technical breakthroughs are nothing new in the automotive industry, though few subjects attract attention like the promise of self-driving cars.

Niels de Boer, program director of the Centre of Excellence for Testing and Research of Autonomous Vehicles at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, said carmakers “need to be realistic” and “very specific” about emerging technology.

But that message was lost as Nissan hosted representatives of government, industry and the media in Singapore this week, where the brand confirmed its upcoming Nissan Leaf electric car will go on sale in Australia.

Set to arrive locally around December, the Leaf promises “ProPilot” self-driving features, up to 400 kilometres of electric range and the ability to offset electrical bills by pumping power back into your home or the wider energy grid.

Nissan’s director of global electric vehicles, Nicholas Thomas, spoke at the same conference as de Boer, saying the Leaf features “fully automated driving systems which can be used in a variety of situations”.

“In city traffic and highway traffic the car will completely steer for you, even around curves,” Mr Thomas said.

“It will stop, it will start, it will hold its speed against a vehicle that it’s following, it will hold its speed on an open highway.

“It’s able to follow a vehicle around curves - I’ve driven a number of ‘self-driving’ systems that, as soon as you get into any radius of bend, immediately give up and suddenly you have to take over the driving. I have not experienced that with ProPilot. It’s a much more advanced system.”

Those claims appear to contradict Nissan vice president Kazuhiro Doi, who told journalists that autonomous technology is “not reachable for consumer use” and that “I cannot tell you where and when” fully autonomous cars will hit the road. Mr Doi said it “takes time” to test autonomous cars in local environments, and that “I don’t have any plans to do something in Australia”.

Mr Thomas’ claims also pale against what Australian automotive media experienced when driving the Leaf in 2017.

Drive.com.au road test editor Stephen Ottley tested the vehicle in Japan, finding Nissan’s ProPilot is “far from an autopilot system the name implies”, and those considering a Leaf “should be aware of its limitations”.

Nissan did not allow conference guests in Singapore to put ProPilot to the test during brief drives at an autonomous vehicle testing centre run by Mr de Boer.

Language surrounding self-driving cars can be vague.

Carlos Ghosn, global head of the Renault Nissan Alliance, told Australian reporters in June last year “by 2022 most of the cars are going to have some kind of autonomy”, without giving specifics as to how that might work.

Nissan isn’t the first company to make bold claims surrounding its autonomous vehicle prowess. Tesla’s Elon Musk told reporters this week the brand will showcase “a major leap forward for our self-driving technology” with a driverless coast-to-coast trip across the US this year, while General Motors has sought approval to operate driverless “Cruise” vehicles with no steering wheel or pedals on US roads.

Mercedes-Benz previously promoted the current E-Class sedan as “a self-driving car from a very self-driven company” in North America before changing its marketing strategy and removing references to driver assistance features as a “drive pilot” program.

De Boer says people need to be wary of exaggerated claims surrounding a driverless future.

“A lot of these claims are quite unhelpful and they are overly aggressive. Legislation to support it is still years away,” de Boer said.

“It’s not anything that’s going to happen in the next three years.

“Do we see major changes to vehicles in 10 years time? I don’t think so.

“They make bold statements but you really need to ask them ‘what do you mean with autonomous driving?’”

An Australian Parliamentary Committee into automated vehicles in Australia recommended in 2017 that local authorities “formally accept that the standard definition for the automation level of vehicles is that used by the Society of Automotive Engineers”. Those definitions rank cars from level one to level five, where the first level involves mild driver warning and assistance features, and the fifth level surrounds driverless pods with no steering wheel or pedals.

Level one and two cars are currently on sale in Australia. Audi’s new A8 sedan, set to arrive mid-year, is the first production vehicle developed for level three functionality, though its ultimate capabilities will not be enabled until effective laws are in place.

Mr Thomas could not say where the Leaf sits on the scale.

Australia currently lacks legal framework and technical infrastructure to make self-driving cars a reality. Mercedes-Benz safety expert Jochen Haab visited Sydney and Melbourne in 2017, telling Drive it “is going to be into the next decade” before level three autonomous cars are allowed to operate in limited areas and conditions such as sections of major motorways in capital cities.

Nissan will offer members of the public an opportunity to ride in autonomous cars through limited trials in Japan next month.

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