Solar Freakin Roadways

LEDs use minute amounts of power

The main issue is cost, though. No politician has the balls to out and out say "this is going to hit your pocket, hard". It would be career suicide. Instead they stealth things in, give with one hand and take with the other.

This kind of project would fall to private enterprise. I wonder how long a mile long section of this road would take to pay for itself at current energy prices? I imaging tens of decades, notwithstanding wear and tear/maintenance. Nothing happens unless in some way it's more economically desirable than the alternative of doing nothing
 
elmarko said:
A key benefit which I'm unsure if it's being touched on or not is that it essentially creates a distribution network - roads usually tie in very well with the same parts of the country which need energy. Not to mention if done correctly internet & phone cables could also be run & replace/installed via a modular repair system.

Additionally a powered surface ties in very well with self-drive cars (sensors within the road) & opens up many interesting fields of study looking at UK wide live driver behaviour. A up/down side (pending on perspective) is that 'live roads' also open up for door for near perfect driver monitoring - once you can track all cars across the roads speeding & wreck-less driving becomes pretty obvious to stop.
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All very interesting. I guess with regard to the 'live roads' it's just something that could potentially go wrong without even getting into the 'big brother' scenario of driver behaviour. Interesting though. I wouldn't feel comfortable knowing I could be done for speeding just because the road 'apparently knows' how fast im going :eek:
 
elmarko said:
I'd imagine pavements would also be converting (solving part of the problem of busy roads) - the additional benefit would be that in areas which are lit artificially already - also powers solar panels in those areas at night.

To trail I'd find an area with the most sunlight within the year, good roads & well lit during night-times - a south coast city would be a good testing ground.
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Another country would make a better testing ground first, America being the most obvious.

It would all come down to how much it would cost to implement really as it certainly isn't going to be cheap. Lying cabling, I would assume it would only need Ethernet and a control centre for the changing of lights etc on the road. Then there is the issue of training, servicing costs etc.

It would really come down to how good the solar system would work, it would have to be able to generate enough electricity to not just run the system but to also to be passed to the grid.
 
The prototype was built in north america/canada where they have the least amount of sunshine and yet the panels could still produce a decent amount of electricity. Even on days with extensive cloud cover.

With only 9% efficiency, if every road in the US was replaced with solar roadways, they would generate 3 times more electricity than they currently consume.

As for cost the base of each panel is made from recycled waste (landfill plastics) so cost wise shouldn't be that high and it also solves another major issue. Waste from landfill!
 
d_brennen said:
LEDs use minute amounts of power

The main issue is cost, though. No politician has the balls to out and out say "this is going to hit your pocket, hard". It would be career suicide. Instead they stealth things in, give with one hand and take with the other.

This kind of project would fall to private enterprise. I wonder how long a mile long section of this road would take to pay for itself at current energy prices? I imaging tens of decades, notwithstanding wear and tear/maintenance. Nothing happens unless in some way it's more economically desirable than the alternative of doing nothing
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Oh yea, I know this, but when you have billions of them lighting up the M25 what's the net power consumption?

You are right about costs though.

Currently M25 does not generate electricity, but it cost's 'X' to run the light's at night.
M25 now generates 'Y' electricity but cost's 'Z' to run the LED's at night.

That's without factoring in the cost's if implementing the change as well.

If it's a net saving of £5m a year, but costs £50m to implement, that's 10 years till it's paid for itself. If the lifespan is even 10 year on a road like the M25?

Figures are purely pulled from my arse. Would it cost in the millions to run all the lights on the M25 for a year? It would certainly costs 10's / 100's millions to make the change.
 
MadMossy said:
The prototype was built in north america/canada where they have the least amount of sunshine and yet the panels could still produce a decent amount of electricity. Even on days with extensive cloud cover.

With only 9% efficiency, if every road in the US was replaced with solar roadways, they would generate 3 times more electricity than they currently consume.

As for cost the base of each panel is made from recycled waste (landfill plastics) so cost wise shouldn't be that high and it also solves another major issue. Waste from landfill!
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Was just reading up on that, rather impressive.

Unfortunately, the estimated price to fill the US is $56trillion.

I really want this to happen!
 
Some numbers for you on its electricity generation.

18.5% efficiency panels which are currently available in large quantities.
4 hours of peak sun shine per day = 1460 hours/year.

Based on 31,000 square miles of road surface to replace in the USA, would generate 21,827 Billion Kilowatt-hours of electricity. More than 3 times the power it currently consumes.
 
Plastics are made from petroleum. I doubt there is enough plastic in landfill to complete our road surfaces, so either we'll need to ramp up oil production or this won't work surely? Although asphalt is also petro based I suppose, so it depends on the ratio's
 
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I like this bit.

These panels must be valuable. What's to keep people from stealing them for home use?

Each panel has its own microprocessor, which communicates wirelessly with the surrounding panels. They monitor each other for malfunctions or problems. Even if someone were able to pull a panel out of the road and load it on a truck, the stolen panel would continue communicating with all of the other panels in the road. The road would know exactly where it was and how fast it was moving, making the criminal a sitting duck for law enforcement.
 
The prototype section they have currently has 3600 watts solar array, how much power that produces I have no idea, obviously some would be lost converting from DC to AC but even still it would be "clean" energy so can't be bad.

Also someone mentioned earthquakes.

While nothing can stop an earthquake and panels would become damaged, those that aren't would still continue to produce power and only the panels broken would need replacing.

They are also aiming for a decentralized power grid, so the power your house uses comes from the panels near your house, not hundreds of miles away from a power station.

If I could invest in this now while it's young I bet I would be rich later on in life when it really takes off.
 
MadMossy said:
The prototype section they have currently has 3600 watts solar array, how much power that produces I have no idea, obviously some would be lost converting from DC to AC but even still it would be "clean" energy so can't be bad.

Also someone mentioned earthquakes.

While nothing can stop an earthquake and panels would become damaged, those that aren't would still continue to produce power and only the panels broken would need replacing.

They are also aiming for a decentralized power grid, so the power your house uses comes from the panels near your house, not hundreds of miles away from a power station.

If I could invest in this now while it's young I bet I would be rich later on in life when it really takes off.
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If one of these panels break, how safe are they going to be to drive on?

Made of plastic right? Sharp plastic isn't going to be great for driving across.
 
but in the future, big companies won't be able to make as much money will they

it uses solar energy, so the electric companies lose money
you can replace small parts, so highway maintenance lose money

if it's good for the consumer, it's bad for the corporates. Unfortunately it's the big corporates who rule the world. Sad, but true.
 
Sounds a good idea but obviously would require a huge amount of money and time to implement over the entirety of the UK; or even just a small area at first such as Greater Manchester/London Etc.

Would these be placed straight ontop of old roads? If not, we'd have to dig up all old roads, even more work.

They said in the video 'exceeds traction requirements' What about in the rain? I ride a motorcycle, anyone else who rides one will know how slippery manhole covers etc. can be when wet.

Another point, these don't at all look very smooth. Certainly look as if they could destroy tyres pretty quickly unless the surface was changed before implementation
 
glen8 said:
but in the future, big companies won't be able to make as much money will they

it uses solar energy, so the electric companies lose money
you can replace small parts, so highway maintenance lose money

if it's good for the consumer, it's bad for the corporates. Unfortunately it's the big corporates who rule the world. Sad, but true.
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How so?

it uses solar energy, so the electric companies lose money

The energy needs to be transported from the road to where it will be used/stored. Who has the expertise in moving and storing power? Energy from solar does not require transporting huge amounts of stuff from point a to point b, dealing with lunatic beardy men and huge amounts of refining. I can imagine with enough solar panels at the right cost per unit, energy companies would be able to generate more profit, lower consumer prices and be more insulated from the politics of said beardy lunatics

you can replace small parts, so highway maintenance lose money

The road would still need maintenance. The conduits underneath would be home to all sorts of cabling and pipework that companies would need access to. Tiles up and down the land would need to be replaced. Who has the infrastructure in place to do this already?
 
If they say it exceeds traction requirements (which were set by the federal highways agency) I am almost certain that would include motorbikes.

From the tests they have done, traction had to be toned down initially because it damaged the testing device because it was too good. They also tested a vehicle traveling at 80 mph and it stopped well within its required distance.
 
As long as the dynamic road warnings are more intelligent than the current overhead ones, it's a great idea in principle.

But if they start telling me about congestion and impose a 40mph speed limit when there's nothing of the sort, then that alone would be enough to put me off.
 
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