Editing Vattenfall (section)

== Car seatbelt ==

Vattenfall played a vital early role in the development of the [[safety belt|seat belt]], developing a two-point seatbelt which became the direct precursor to the modern [[Seat belt#Three-point|three-point]] seatbelt. 

Fatal car accidents were rapidly increasing in [[Sweden]] during the 1950s. When a study at Vattenfall of accidents among employees revealed that the majority of casualties came from [[Traffic collision|car accidents]].<ref>{{cite web
 | access-date = 2023-09-12
 | date        = 2018-04-06
 | language    = en-US
 | title       = How Volvo Invented the Modern Seat Belt
 | url         = https://news.yahoo.com/volvo-invented-modern-seat-belt-160000528.html
 | website     = Yahoo News
}}</ref> Vattenfall discussed this finding with vehicle manufacturers including [[Volvo Cars|Volvo]] and [[Saab Automobile|Saab]]. The companies provided Vattenfall with test cars, but were not enthusiastic about Vattenfall's suggestion of incorporating seat belts for better safety due to concerns that seat belts might make drivers think that driving a car was dangerous.

In light of this, two Vattenfall engineers, Bengt Odelgard and Per-Olof Weman, started to develop a safety belt. This development work let to the creation of a diagonal seat belt, known as the 'Vattenfall seat belt' to be used in their vehicles.<ref>{{cite book
 | date        = 2000
 | first1       = Rune
 | first2      = Claes-Göran
 | isbn        = 978-91-630-9389-0
 | last1        = Andréasson
 | last2       = Bäckström
 | title       = The Seat Belt: Swedish Research and Development for Global Automotive Safety
 | publisher = EO Print
 | url         = https://trid.trb.org/view/712993
}}</ref> Until the mid 1960s, this was the standard seatbelt in Sweden and various countries in Europe. Their work set the standard for safety belts in cars worldwide and was presented to Volvo in the late 1950s, who went on to develop the idea into the three-point safety belt. <ref>{{cite book
 | author2     = Claes-Göran Bäckström
 | first       = Rune
 | isbn        = 91-630-9389-8
 | last        = Andréasson
 | location    = Stockholm
 | pages       = 9, 15–16
 | publisher   = Kulturvårdskommittén Vattenfall AB
 | title       = The Seat Belt : Swedish Research and Development for Global Automotive Safety
 | year        = 2000
}}</ref>