American duo dreams big and hopes to install a sun-hungry street by you, one day (and much to your benefit)
What’s the craziest thing you can think of? Well, it probably isn’t the roads in our country completely covered with hexagonal solar panels, but for us it is. If properly implemented, this technology would not only change the way we drive, it would provide enough power to put current electric power plants out of business. Say that again-eliminated. Impossible? Not according to Scott and Julie Brusaw.
The Brusaw’s are the husband and wife team behind Solar Roadways, the company behind these wildly ambitious ideas. They have received funding from the US Department of Transportation and, just last year, received over 2 million dollars via IndieGoGo, a popular crowdfunding site. Evidently there are a lot of others that think this idea has merit and is worth looking into.
Wondering how this would work? By mating millions of ultra-strong hexagonical panels together and covering our nations roadways with them. The panels themselves contain electrical components. Heating elements would keep the panels snow and ice free when the weather was cold and illuminating LEDS would light up traffic guidance lanes.
Not only would solar roadway panels power themselves for vehicular traffic needs, theoretically the energy could be exported from the panels too. If you had enough panels, you could generate an awful lot of power. In fact, some estimates project the power from these roads could completely eliminate current and future electrical power plants if enough were constructed.
The solar roadways team has been working on prototypes for years now and are very close to condensing their ideas into the actual production of these items. Because the concept is so ‘forward thinking’, it is unlikely that the panels would see commercial use just yet but it would serve as a proof of concept.
While it’s an undeniably great idea, the solar roadways concept still has a lot of details to be fleshed out. Covering even a small part of the road infrastructure in the US would be a huge, ultra-expensive affair. Almost incomprehensible, maybe, but that’s just how the future occurs, through wild-eyed visionaries that aren’t afraid to dream nor push the envelope.
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Earthgarage – Greener Car. Fatter Wallet.