Apparently this is real — fascinating! ( The relevant text of the bill is here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/3684... )

This builds on an NHTSA-funded pilot program called Driver Alcohol Detection System for Safety (DADDS; https://www.dadss.org/).

DADDS advanced two technologies for passive impaired driving detection: non-contact breath sensors (exhaled EtOH near the driver), and touch sensors (embedded into the steering wheel).

The bill adds this as a requirement on top of existing distracted driving prevention systems, which have been expanding but don't always get much press (e.g. Subaru's driver-facing cameras).

Seems like a little hand sanitizer would fool both.

The wording in the actual bill looks vague enough that I hope this is more for show than for actual implementation.

It specifically requires non-contact sensors that can “accurately” detect blood alcohol level of the driver. It may be possible to detect trace exhaled alcohol in the air, but you’re never going to get accurate blood alcohol measurements from proximity alone.

In the unlikely event that such a system made it to market, it would quickly become common knowledge among alcoholics that it could be defeated by rolling down your window to get more airflow through the cabin. More airflow means trace alcohol in the air is diluted and blown away. Reading goes to zero.

The bill also requires that the technology limit the operation of a vehicle after impairment is detected. There’s no way a system that suddenly causes a vehicle to slow down to pedestrian speeds could be considered safe for use on freeways. Can you imagine someone’s car slowing to a crawl on the freeway and forcing them to move at low speeds on the shoulder because their distraction detection system had a false positive? Even a false positive rate of 0.001% would mean a lot of us would pass a car experiencing a false positive on our commute every week. Awful.

About your last paragraph: the goal of these measurements would of course be to prefect you from driving at all when alcohol is detected. Suggesting that the idea is that people are slowed down on a freeway because of this seems absurd.

failing to project that this would happen all day every day everywhere, is absurd

No it's not. Car manufacturers and regulators have been trying to make cars safer for decades and won't just (require to) add some feature that is as unsafe as your proposed "solution" And the solution here is simple: do the check when the car is starting and don't drive when alcohol is detected. That's how current alcohol locks work. Nobody is suggesting to test when the car is already driving and nobody is suggesting to slow cars down.

>They're really working on making automobiles a lot safer by installing breathalyzers in every car. Exciting times!

Can't tell if sarcasm.

Some groups are huge fans of making everything as safe as possible.

This is an exciting win for them.

Still can't tell...

>If you know anyone who has been affected by the callous and careless behavior of drunk drivers, ask them if they agree.

I bet if you asked 9/11 victims whether they want the PATRIOT act, they'd agree as well. That doesn't mean it's a good reason to support it, or that their feelings should be given more weight than anyone else's.

Wow, you just somehow denigrated both 9/11 victims and drunk driving victims while attempting to defend the right to drive drunk. Congratulations.

>Wow, you just somehow denigrated both 9/11 victims and drunk driving victims

how? by pointing out that their opinions don't get an automatic free pass because they were victims?

>while attempting to defend the right to drive drunk. Congratulations.

Congratulations on generalizing everyone who's against such measures as "defend the right to drive drunk". That's exactly the same argument as surveillance supporters, who claim that if you're against surveillance you must be a terrorist/pedophile/criminal and/or support them.

You can be against drunk driving, but be skeptical or against this specific implementation of anti-drunk driving measures. As it stands right now, you haven't provided any justification for why it's warranted and is worth the costs, aside from "ask [drunk driving victims] if they agree".