In a notice, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Tesla had notified the agency that it self-certified the driverless cars as being compliant with applicable federal safety standards for motor vehicles.
But the Cybercab lacks “permanently attached, conventional manual controls, such as a brake pedal, gas pedal, steering wheel, and mirrors,” NHTSA said.
Autonomous vehicle developers can seek an exemption from the agency to commercially deploy — for a limited period of time — cars that don’t have required features like a typical brake pedal. It appears Tesla didn’t do that. Instead, it relied on self-certification of compliance with what are officially known as Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, or FMVSS.
Tesla didn’t respond to a request for comment. Competitor Zoox recently received an exemption, which is temporary, for its robotaxis, which don’t have manual controls either.
NHTSA said it was opening its review to “examine the process and technical data on which Tesla relied when certifying the Cybercab and related issues.” The agency estimated that 1,000 vehicles would fall under its investigation.
“Among other things, NHTSA will consider the extent to which Tesla’s certification depended on determinations that certain FMVSS are inapplicable to the Cybercab,” the notice said.
The agency said the probe was prompted by “public information” but didn’t elaborate.