Now it is a bit difference as that's a for a Level 4 Robo-Taxi where Tesla is trying to turn a Level 2 vehicle into a Level 4 vehicle.
Tesla is aiming to make FSD self-driving in the entire continental US, with no geofencing, on all roads, day and night and in all weather. By definition, that's actually L5, not L4! So Tesla is aiming to go from L2 to L5 in the continental US. It would be L4 if Tesla decided to restrict FSD to only certain roads or only certain conditions in order to make the FSD work.
I don't know how far the NHTSA will allow Tesla to go with Level 2 before requiring them to get similar approval for Level 4.
As long as Tesla requires the driver to pay attention and keeps the nags as the means to ensure driver attention, I imagine the NHTSA will give Tesla a lot of leeway. Driver attention is a nice crutch because if your system is not good enough, you can always fall back on the driver should pay attention and there are nags to ensure they do. However, to be certified as autonomous, L3 and above, I would imagine that NHTSA would require Tesla prove that FSD meets some standard of safety. If Tesla cannot prove that FSD meets that standard of safety as an autonomous system then the NHTSA would presumably require driver attention.
The tricky part for Tesla is that they are going for L5 because they are developing FSD to work on thousands of cars spread all over the continental US, on all roads, day and night, etc... This means that Tesla has to show that FSD is reliable enough, not just in one area, but in the entire US, on all roads and all conditions. That's a very high bar to meet. Presumably, Tesla can use disengagement rate from AP to show this but they still need to get the disengagement rate of the fleet in the entire continental US good enough.
That is one advantage that companies like Cruise and Waymo have. By only going for L4 geofenced to a small urban area, they don't need to show that their robotaxis can work safely everywhere, they only need to show that their robotaxis work in a particular geofenced area. It's a lower bar.
I'm also really curious to see how wide of areas, and weather conditions the Bolts are allowed to operate.
I imagine the Bolts will be tightly geofenced to certain areas where the system has been fully tested. So, if Cruise has disengagement data and safety data to show that their robotaxis are reliable enough in a particular geofenced area, then the NHTSA could give permission to operate only in that geofenced area.