Solar Smart Roadways Provide Power, Traffic Control, & Other Cool Benefits - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Don Knotts;44946149]Glass isn't safest surface to drive on, especially with shit like gravel and dirt getting under tires. Not to mention they wouldn't actually generate enough power to melt snow off of it. The article is pretty optimistic but I just don't actually see this being a viable road alternative in most, if any situations. At least not anywhere near its current state.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Foogooman;44945892]Everyone should read the FAQ before posting [url]http://solarroadways.com/faq.shtml[/url][/QUOTE] [QUOTE=JohnFisher89;44946456]Ford was able to see a return on investment in his short term, this would cost something like 50 trillion dollars to get a negligible return of what exactly? Safer roads? Potentially more power to the grid?[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Foogooman;44945892]Everyone should read the FAQ before posting [url]http://solarroadways.com/faq.shtml[/url][/QUOTE]

yeah the FAQ doesn't really answer much "Who owns the electricity that your new infrastructure produces? Short answer: whoever owns the property: For driveways, patios, sidewalks: the home owner. For parking lots: the business owner. For tarmacs: the airport. Roads get a little trickier: they can be owned privately, by the city, township, county, state, or federal government. The city may own the roads and become the utility company. Or the utility companies may become road builders. It's hard to tell at this point. Kind of like asking the Wright Brothers in 1903 how a luggage carousel at the Denver International Airport would work. " So basically the State, not private companies like currently. Yeah that won't bite us in the ass... it also doesn't tell us who this would be run by or the estimated operating costs of these roadways. [quote] [h=3]Are you using rare earth metals in your Solar Road Panels? Will there be enough? Will it be toxic?[/h] Neither of us have expertise in this area, but we plan to hire a materials engineer who does to help us. One of our main goals is to help the environment, so we will always do what we can to make wise choices. Our circuit boards are simple and only contain small copper traces: no gold or silver required. We can use any kind of solar cells in our system: mono-crystalline, poly-crystalline, thin film, etc. We can use other materials that make sense as they are proven and become cost effective such as graphene, dye sensitive solar cells, etc. We'll weigh all of the pros and cons of each type of solar cell prior to making our final decision going into production. Same for all materials.[/quote] They don't really know what they are going to use :psyduck:. This is one of those "really cool ideas" yet highly impracticle.

[QUOTE=helifreak;44796353]Ah but hexagons contain [i]6[/i] triangles![/QUOTE] 4* [img]http://i.imgur.com/eCUqVQD.png[/img]

[QUOTE=DarkMonkey;44945320]Yeah this just seems a bit... why go through all the effort of [i]replacing[/i] roads, which have their own set of massive challenges, instead of just building solar panels across [i]all the fucking empty countryside we have seriously we could probably fit at least a europe or two into all the space we aren't using[/i][/QUOTE] Because you'd be displacing native animals and plants. Solar plants take up A TON of space, and have drastic ecological impact. Even in those spaces where it looks like "lol nothing lives here", there's TONS of critters that call that land home. [QUOTE=Foogooman;44945376]I don't understand this perspective at all. When they built New York City nobody was like "no let's just not, the end cost would be too much" These things happen slowly over time.[/QUOTE] The thing that solar enthusiasts don't like to tell you is: 1) Solar panels are expensive as balls. The technology to make them economically feasible on a large scale isn't quite here yet. 2) Solar panels aren't as eco-friendly as you'd think, considering the waste products created in their construction. 3) Solar panels are inefficient as fuck. They turn only 10-15% of the sun's energy into electricity. That's assuming it's pointed full-blast at the sun on a completely clear day. On top of that, look at those panels they're proposing. It looks like only about 50-60% of the hexagons are actually solar panels. Plus you have all the electronics inside, LEDs, some sort of battery/super capacitor (also expensive/ecologically harmful in construction), all of which are drawing power, plus the required copper and fiberglass for the PCBs, the list goes on. That and considering they're not packed quite as full of solar cells as you'd hope, their estimates on the energy produced might be WAY too generous an estimate (possibly just using total surface area of the roads and converting that straight into solar panel area, again on a bright clear day). Don't get me wrong, this is a FANTASTIC idea, but the technology to make it ecologically friendly, cost-effective, and efficient enough to even be considered isn't here yet.

[QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947312]wurds[/QUOTE] It's less about generating power as it is having an easier to maintain road system that is active in pointing out hazards. It would be extremely helpful to have a system that can detect when a large animal is on the road and warn the driver ahead of time.

I'd like to see roads that have glow in the dark lighting for driving at night. Still, the solar power idea is pretty kickass. Could we potentially combine the two?

[QUOTE=Foogooman;44945434]You know what else was expensive? Building the fucking country. This is like if Ford said "I've created this motor vehicle and I hope to build enough so potentially everyone in the country could have one" and everyone immediately jumps down his throat screaming "YOU WANT TO BUILD THEM ALL SIMULTANEOUSLY? YOU'RE FUCKING INSANE THAT WOULD BE EXPENSIVE. LET'S JUST NOT"[/QUOTE] That logic is fucked. It's not like america existed, then someone was like "let's build another america". That [I]would [/I] be fucking expensive, and ridiculous. It was just natural progression. This solar idea is trying to stuff a round peg in a square hole. We can make it fit but only if we throw huge amounts of money at it. And then, as their site says, they have to be replaced in 20 to 30 years time. The benefits will be marginal unless it's done on a massive scale, and if it's done on a massive scale it will be stupid expensive.

[QUOTE=zombini;44947468]It's less about generating power as it is having an easier to maintain road system that is active in pointing out hazards. It would be extremely helpful to have a system that can detect when a large animal is on the road and warn the driver ahead of time.[/QUOTE] Except that their main selling point for these roads is "WOWEE ZOWEE LOOK AT ALL THE POWER WE COULD MAKE!"

I feel like this is something that will happen, but at a much slower pace than everyone wants it to happen. Like these two are just the people to really push this sort of topic into motion. I don't think they'll be the ones who get it done, but they'll be given credit as pioneers when it finally does happen.

[QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947700]Except that their main selling point for these roads is "WOWEE ZOWEE LOOK AT ALL THE POWER WE COULD MAKE!"[/QUOTE] Gotta have some sort of a pitch. If the pitch line was "WOWEE LOOK AT THESE HEXAGONAL UNITS THAT LIGHT UP FOR SAFETY!! HOW COOL IS THAT?", nobody would be interested at all.

[QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947312]Because you'd be displacing native animals and plants. Solar plants take up A TON of space, and have drastic ecological impact. Even in those spaces where it looks like "lol nothing lives here", there's TONS of critters that call that land home. The thing that solar enthusiasts don't like to tell you is: 1) Solar panels are expensive as balls. The technology to make them economically feasible on a large scale isn't quite here yet.[/QUOTE] This is more or less true. [QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947312]2) Solar panels aren't as eco-friendly as you'd think, considering the waste products created in their construction.[/QUOTE] As is this. The offset gained from green energy is arguably less significant than the damage caused by mining the materials needed for them and the waste produced in the manufacturing process. No qualms with this statement. [QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947312]3) Solar panels are inefficient as fuck. They turn only 10-15% of the sun's energy into electricity. That's assuming it's pointed full-blast at the sun on a completely clear day. On top of that, look at those panels they're proposing. It looks like only about 50-60% of the hexagons are actually solar panels. Plus you have all the electronics inside, LEDs, some sort of battery/super capacitor (also expensive/ecologically harmful in construction), all of which are drawing power, plus the required copper and fiberglass for the PCBs, the list goes on. That and considering they're not packed quite as full of solar cells as you'd hope, their estimates on the energy produced might be WAY too generous an estimate (possibly just using total surface area of the roads and converting that straight into solar panel area, again on a bright clear day).[/QUOTE] This point I take some issue with. All forms of energy conversion are inefficient to some degree; that's just thermodynamics at work. True, commercial solar panels are still very inefficient even by those standards but they're only getting better with time, and there have been solar panels build in the lab that have exceeded 40% efficiency. Also, the 'inefficiency' doesn't so much matter when you're covering such a huge area of land with them. Inefficiency is a bit of a bitch when you're physically supplying the fuel yourself and realise that you're wasting a lot of it, but we're not supplying solar panels any fuel - the universe is doing that part for us. All the time too, actually. In fact I'd argue that increasing our current use of 0% sunlight on current roads to 10% is actually a pretty big step in the right direction. The 'fuel' is constantly being flung at us, and we're hardly utilising it at all; might as well make a start on changing that. The LEDs draining power isn't a good argument either. LEDs require VERY LITTLE energy to run; I mean, hell, most modern day phones have a fairly powerful LED flashlight built into them which can run from your phone's battery (admittedly it will drain it fairly quickly, but the amount of energy stored in your phone's battery is in no way comparable to the amount of energy these solar panels would produce). I'm sure they've also taken into account that the entire hexagon doesn't capture sunlight; it's not that difficult of a calculation. Just multiply the total surface area of the road by the areal fraction of one hexagon's solar cell area to non solar cell area. I'm sure they've also probably used the average power incident on a surface throughout the day instead of the max (it's also not exactly a difficult thing to do). The really difficult thing to do (which would impact power estimates) would be trying to 'average' the inclination of all roads throughout a given area which would impact the power available. [QUOTE=Zero-Point;44947312]Don't get me wrong, this is a FANTASTIC idea, but the technology to make it ecologically friendly, cost-effective, and efficient enough to even be considered isn't here yet.[/QUOTE] Hopefully that's what this will lead to. Gotta make a start somewhere.

While I don't think this will work economically, I do wish to point out a couple of things. 1) asphalt isn't clean either. Yes asphalt can constantly be recycled, but doing so consumes energy at, what I can assume, a fairly significant rate. 2) In much of the northern US it is the weather that destroys roads. Not earth quakes or traffic so much. A road surface that can eliminate ice and snow damage is going to be economically feasible much faster in these regions. Montana has two seasons: winter and road-work. This is an old saying, but it really is true. Huge sums of money must be used every year to repair road damage caused by winter.

[QUOTE=No_Excuses;44947665]That logic is fucked. It's not like america existed, then someone was like "let's build another america". That [I]would [/I] be fucking expensive, and ridiculous. It was just natural progression. This solar idea is trying to stuff a round peg in a square hole. We can make it fit but only if we throw huge amounts of money at it. And then, as their site says, they have to be replaced in 20 to 30 years time. The benefits will be marginal unless it's done on a massive scale, and if it's done on a massive scale it will be stupid expensive.[/QUOTE] That's my exact point, if this proves to be a good idea it will happen slowly over time and eventually we'll get to the end result. 20 to 30 years is a long time. In the northern states, most roads needs to be replaced every year.

I am highly skeptical of this but donated a few bucks anyway. I'm glad that at least somebody is willing to try out a potential solution.

I don't feel like many facepunchers even use the road for anything but walking or biking on. Road surfaces are incredibly important to the motor vehicles which travel on them. Every vehicle is going to react incredibly different on this surface. Not to mention that the road surface is incredibly poorly designed and has characteristics very bad for motor vehicles. A surface like the ones they have as prototypes will not only be incredibly unsafe to drive at moderate speeds on due to low surface contact but will cause excessive tire and suspension wear as well as very excessive noise and vibrations to the occupants of the vehicle. Oh, to think of it it would be very unpleasant to walk or bike on as well. These really only look good to be used as driveways, sidewalks and parking lots at most.

I [B]very[/B] much doubt they'd pay for themselves through energy collection alone, normal solar panels are already not all that efficient and take years to do that. However, having smart roads that can signal obstructions/reduce the need for street lights/provide cheap infrastructure channels/can be replaced more quickly is a [B]really[/B] good idea imo. On the other hand, silica dust (from glass) is toxic and can't be removed from the lungs by biological processes. No idea how that compares to the stuff from the current road surfaces though, it makes up 20%+ of respirable dust already.

[QUOTE=sltungle;44947998]This point I take some issue with. All forms of energy conversion are inefficient to some degree; that's just thermodynamics at work. True, commercial solar panels are still very inefficient even by those standards but they're only getting better with time, and there have been solar panels build in the lab that have exceeded 40% efficiency.[/quote] Which is why I went on to say that we're not close to making it feasible YET. Current solar-cell tech is holding this idea back like you wouldn't believe. [quote]Also, the 'inefficiency' doesn't so much matter when you're covering such a huge area of land with them. Inefficiency is a bit of a bitch when you're physically supplying the fuel yourself and realise that you're wasting a lot of it, but we're not supplying solar panels any fuel - the universe is doing that part for us. All the time too, actually. In fact I'd argue that increasing our current use of 0% sunlight on current roads to 10% is actually a pretty big step in the right direction. The 'fuel' is constantly being flung at us, and we're hardly utilising it at all; might as well make a start on changing that.[/quote] It DOES matter when you have to consider the amount of cells you have to manufacture in order to achieve certain energy through-puts. That'd be like saying we might as well make roads out of thermopiles instead. Sure they don't produce squat for energy, but hey it's something right? It's not just energy inefficiency, it's utilization that's important. Plus, as said, they produce that meager 10-15% ONLY when the sun is facing them head-on. That they're behind glass at all means it will be diffused to an extent, plus dirt and road-grime build-up (cleaning would be a regular and expensive procedure, especially in areas that lack water). [quote]The LEDs draining power isn't a good argument either. LEDs require VERY LITTLE energy to run; I mean, hell, most modern day phones have a fairly powerful LED flashlight built into them which can run from your phone's battery (admittedly it will drain it fairly quickly, but the amount of energy stored in your phone's battery is in no way comparable to the amount of energy these solar panels would produce).[/quote] There's more than LEDs in there, there's control circuitry, too. With as relative little power as you're producing from these, every watt counts, and having something chewing away at it like that won't help any. Plus that's why I also brought up the point of localized energy storage: Can you imagine the INSANE amount of batteries/super-caps that would have to be made to store the energy long enough for it to work through the night, or through a storm? And your phone battery has a higher energy density and through-put than a solar cell does. The panels you see in that video within the hexagon? I can almost guarantee you that each one is generating milli-Amps. MILLI-AMPS. I'd be surprised to learn they make more than 10W with full exposure. The LEDs they used in these would have to be bright enough to be seen in full daylight in order to be useful, meaning they'd have to draw at least a couple of watts. [quote]I'm sure they've also taken into account that the entire hexagon doesn't capture sunlight; it's not that difficult of a calculation. Just multiply the total surface area of the road by the areal fraction of one hexagon's solar cell area to non solar cell area. I'm sure they've also probably used the average power incident on a surface throughout the day instead of the max (it's also not exactly a difficult thing to do). The really difficult thing to do (which would impact power estimates) would be trying to 'average' the inclination of all roads throughout a given area which would impact the power available.[/quote] Fair point, but remember, these people want money to try and get their idea out there. Not out-right accusing them of it, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if they fudged their numbers a little bit.

10W is easily 1.5 orders of magnitude above what the electronics would use. Not the heating though. They also want to hook them up to the power grid, so storage wouldn't be an issue. I think [I]all things considered[/I] there would be a net gain vs conventional surfaces, unless there's a health hazard that's worse than otherwise.

[QUOTE=slayer3032;44949625]I don't feel like many facepunchers even use the road for anything but walking or biking on. Road surfaces are incredibly important to the motor vehicles which travel on them. Every vehicle is going to react incredibly different on this surface. Not to mention that the road surface is incredibly poorly designed and has characteristics very bad for motor vehicles. A surface like the ones they have as prototypes will not only be incredibly unsafe to drive at moderate speeds on due to low surface contact but will cause excessive tire and suspension wear as well as very excessive noise and vibrations to the occupants of the vehicle. Oh, to think of it it would be very unpleasant to walk or bike on as well. These really only look good to be used as driveways, sidewalks and parking lots at most.[/QUOTE] this exact point they do address in their FAQ, and it says it's been grip tested up to 80mph and that the vehicles stopped in the required distance, they put a person on a bicycle on there with no weirdness.

Why don't they place them literally anywhere else

Even if you go with 10% efficiency there's still 1.4 kW/m^2 of sunlight falling on the Earth's surface on a bright day. I doubt they'd generate as little as 10 w. 100 w is probably a more reasonable estimate.

[QUOTE=sltungle;44950847]Even if you go with 10% efficiency there's still 1.4 kW/m^2 of sunlight falling on the Earth's surface on a bright day. I doubt they'd generate as little as 10 w. 100 w is probably a more reasonable estimate.[/QUOTE] 1400w only when the sun is directly overhead and its sunny. It's reduced greatly depending on lattitude, season, cloud cover and time of day. They even admit on their site that a tilted panel is 31% more efficient then a flat in winter one but of course you can't have them tilted because it's a road. These things would be better off in a standalone solar farm.

[QUOTE=GunFox;44948766]While I don't think this will work economically, I do wish to point out a couple of things. 1) asphalt isn't clean either. Yes asphalt can constantly be recycled, but doing so consumes energy at, what I can assume, a fairly significant rate. 2) In much of the northern US it is the weather that destroys roads. Not earth quakes or traffic so much. A road surface that can eliminate ice and snow damage is going to be economically feasible much faster in these regions. Montana has two seasons: winter and road-work. This is an old saying, but it really is true. Huge sums of money must be used every year to repair road damage caused by winter.[/QUOTE] The roads would have problems melting heavy snowfall with strong light and with panels not covered in massive amounts of dirt. In order to actually melt snow, they would be a singularly ridiculous drain on the electric grid. Even with a large amount of energy storage built in, or utility sheds every so often with rows of capacitors, that is still going to be a serious problem, assuming that the panels could even provide enough power in the first place when it actually was sunny (an assumption that seems unlikely, given everything else that is going on)

[QUOTE=Tamschi;44950441]10W is easily 1.5 orders of magnitude above what the electronics would use. Not the heating though. They also want to hook them up to the power grid, so storage wouldn't be an issue. I think [I]all things considered[/I] there would be a net gain vs conventional surfaces, unless there's a health hazard that's worse than otherwise.[/QUOTE] Storage IS an issue. You have to have power provided all of the time, and solar panels can't do that due to night-time and cloud cover. Plus you have to have something to provide steady electrical output for the electronics that control the LEDs, plus the LEDs themselves. And 10W is a VERY generous guess, I'd say it's closer to 2-4W. You're totally right about the heating though. 3.451 BTUs per-watt is going to be a HEAVY drain on power in the colder seasons/regions, especially considering this means there'll likely be cloud cover, meaning pretty much NO energy production at all. [editline]30th May 2014[/editline] [QUOTE=Zephyrs;44953675]The roads would have problems melting heavy snowfall with strong light and with panels not covered in massive amounts of dirt. In order to actually melt snow, they would be a singularly ridiculous drain on the electric grid. Even with a large amount of energy storage built in, or utility sheds every so often with rows of capacitors, that is still going to be a serious problem, assuming that the panels could even provide enough power in the first place when it actually was sunny (an assumption that seems unlikely, given everything else that is going on)[/QUOTE] Even regions that you think would be ideal for this sort of tech (like the southwest) would be an issue, because if there's one thing we have in the southwest, it's wind and sand. Sand covering these panels would be a nightmare. And besides that, they must be pretty much perfectly sealed, in order to keep water out, right? What sort of electronics/LEDs do they plan on using that won't destroy themselves considering the heat that will inevitably be trapped in these things, particularly in much hotter regions like the southwest? ANOTHER problem: Forested areas. The only time these things would generate any reasonable amount of light on heavily forested roads would be around noon, drastically reducing over-all throughput. THEN you have to consider transmission. You HAVE to have an inverter somewhere to economically transmit the power via AC current, and there'll be power loss during that conversion as well.

[QUOTE=GunFox;44948766] 1) asphalt isn't clean either. Yes asphalt can constantly be recycled, but doing so consumes energy at, what I can assume, a fairly significant rate.[/QUOTE] Improperly maintained asphalt contaminates the soil with toxins, as well. When was the last time anyone saw [i]properly[/i] maintained asphalt?

[QUOTE=Zeke129;44955413]Improperly maintained asphalt contaminates the soil with toxins, as well. When was the last time anyone saw [i]properly[/i] maintained asphalt?[/QUOTE] I'm from Indiana and I was amazed at how even the minor, lesser traveled roads in Nevada, Arizona and western Colorado were in absolutely amazing shape. Here in Indiana the weather really rips up the roads so quickly.

[QUOTE=OvB;44793866]Hexagons are the future[/QUOTE] Halo 3 predicted it: [url]http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BeehiveBarrier[/url]

[QUOTE=Zeke129;44955413]Improperly maintained asphalt contaminates the soil with toxins, as well. When was the last time anyone saw [i]properly[/i] maintained asphalt?[/QUOTE] The minor highways in New Mexico are so shit, one time a friend and I were driving to Albuquerque and his iPod Nano skipped.

[QUOTE=Zephyrs;44953675]The roads would have problems melting heavy snowfall with strong light and with panels not covered in massive amounts of dirt. In order to actually melt snow, they would be a singularly ridiculous drain on the electric grid. Even with a large amount of energy storage built in, or utility sheds every so often with rows of capacitors, that is still going to be a serious problem, assuming that the panels could even provide enough power in the first place when it actually was sunny (an assumption that seems unlikely, given everything else that is going on)[/QUOTE] Heating two inches of snow fall that occurs over one hour would require 2MW per km of two-lane road during that time (based on a few estimates about snow). This assumes the snow is at freezing, and the road was too. That's ~$240 of electricty. Running snow plows is expensive. I'm seeing prices around $130/hr for a personal driveway. I'm not sure how long it takes for a snow plow to clear a two lane road, but it could easily cost about the same as heating it. Heating it rather than plowing it also means less time spent covered and less road damage, which probably easily works out to being cheaper. Further, it can handle larger snow falls much more quickly (blizzards would be expensive, rather than debilitating) and prevents any icing. The road would not be providing the storage or the production for the clearing. They already made that much clear.

Why not put the solar panels along the sides of the roads? Why put them in the roads? That makes not sense at all. There are zero benefits to putting them there. Can somebody actually answer this question for me?