Feasibility Study of VLC-Based Collective Perception for Vehicular Communication

This study explores the use of Visible Light Communication (VLC) in Collective Perception (CP), a technology that enables vehicles and infrastructure to share sensor information to help reduce traffic accidents. Recent advances in Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communication have spurred growing research interest in CP. However, in regions such as the United States and Japan, only 30 MHz of radio spectrum is allocated for V2X, which is insufficient to effectively support CP. In this paper, we propose integrating VLC into V2X systems to enhance CP, complementing the existing 5.9 GHz band for V2X communications. VLC can coexist with wireless systems that use radio waves, providing an additional optical channel for data exchange. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to investigate VLC for CP. We evaluate the feasibility of VLC-based CP through three experiments. First, we measured the application-level delay of a VLC-based CP system in a stationary indoor environment. Next, we evaluated its communication range in a stationary outdoor setting. Finally, to assess robustness under realistic conditions, we conducted driving experiments at vehicle speeds up to 90 km/h. The results demonstrate that VLC-based CP is feasible and could serve as a promising solution to spectrum scarcity in the 5.9 GHz band for future V2X communications.