The following description was taken from NHVR: Review of Major Crash Rates for Australian Higher Productivity Vehicles: 2015 – 2019 :
The concept for Performance Based Standards (PBS) vehicles was initiated in 1998 by the then National Road Transport Commission (NRTC). The scheme was formally introduced in 2007 and continued to evolve with full operational implementation being given to the National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (NHVR) in 2013.
The results show an overall improvement in safety outcomes of 60% when compared to the conventional fleet on a distance travelled basis.
This is a significant improvement over the results in a 2017 report which found a 46% improvement over the conventional fleet.
When comparing conventional rigid trucks (with or without trailers) to their PBS equivalents, the improvement in safety is slightly less pronounced than the overall average however still marked at 47.3% on a distance travelled basis.
PBS articulated combinations had the lowest rate of crashes per distance travelled with 5.4 crashes per 100 million kilometres travelled, almost 70% lower than the rate for their conventional counterparts.
Applying these safety performance figures and forecasting over a period from 2013 to 2033, this should result in a saving of 143 lives not lost in heavy vehicle involved crashes.