The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) released its “Hyperloop Standards Desk Review” on Friday.
A document that aims to assess hyperloop standard development status, the desk review is anticipated to begin a dialogue for future hyperloop standardization efforts and to identify stakeholder perspectives on existing testing and deployment standards.
In July of last year, the DOT released “Pathways to the Future of Transportation: A Non-Traditional and Emerging Transportation Technology (NETT) Council Guidance Document (Pathways to the Future of Transportation)” to provide a framework for the department’s approach to non-traditional and emerging technologies, including hyperloop. As a result, stakeholders shared that it would be helpful if the DOT considered the applicability of international or private sector standards to hyperloop systems in the United States.
The Desk Review provides a preliminary map of existing standards and the regulations specific to hyperloop systems components but is not intended to be a comprehensive, prescriptive, or definitive document. Instead, the DOT said it would also request public comment and feedback on the document.
Established in March 2019, the NETT Council, or Non-traditional and Emerging Transportation Technology Council, is an internal deliberative body that identifies and resolves jurisdictional and regulatory gaps in policy that may impede the deployment of new technologies, such as advances in tunneling technology and hyperloop.
Comprised of the Office of the Secretary of Transportation and nine operating administrations, each with its own traditional jurisdiction over certain environment and regulatory approvals, the council works together to help speed the deployment of new technologies through the DOTs existing regulatory structure.