A draft act on uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) experiments has been sent to the Cabinet, a Ministry of Science and Technology (MST) official said yesterday, expressing the hope that it would enter legislative review in the upcoming session.
UAVs are a crucial technological trend and the most promising application of artificial intelligence, with many technology giants, such as Google and Amazon, investing in their development, Department of Foresight and Innovation Policies Director-General Yang Hsiu-ya (楊琇雅) said.
The Taipei, New Taipei City and Kaohsiung minicipal governments have started working with foreign developers to introduce uncrewed vehicles, she said.
As uncrewed vehicles’ compatibility with real-world environments is key, a major problem for developers is whether transportation laws can be relaxed to allow room for experiments, she said.
Different kinds of vehicles are subject to different laws — land vehicles are regulated by the Highway Act (公路法) and marine vessels by the Ships Act (船舶法) — but it would be extremely difficult for the government to amend existing laws to accommodate innovations in UAVs, she said.
Therefore, the ministry has laid out fundamental regulations for uncrewed ground, sea and aerial vehicles, which can facilitate the work of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to revise its administrative guidelines, she said.
The Cabinet is weighing whether UAVs should be supervised by the science ministry or the transportation ministry and a decision should be reached before the bill enters legislature review, she said.
The science ministry plans to establish a cross-ministerial committee to review applications for uncrewed vehicle experiments and required security measures, while the transportation ministry would be in charge of real-world testing of the vehicles, she said.
The committee would determine which UAVs are necessary and innovative, but could breach laws, and then offer suggestions to the transportation ministry, Yang said, adding the the latter would give the final approval to vehicle developers and regulate their traffic.
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