We are so honored – Solar Roadways has been chosen by Popular Science as one of the 100 Greatest Innovations of 2014! It’s in their 27th annual “Best of What…
Video Rating: 4 / 5
Dec
30
Solar FREAKIN’ Roadways!
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akagi33370 says:
December 30, 2014 at 12:53 am (UTC 0)
Ok, Guyssss, I know it may sound harsh and negative, but this video is just
pure horse crap. This won’t happen. There is nowhere near enough money to
make a few 10,000 square miles of moderately complicated electronics, let
alone the material to make it. We would have to tear out ALL of the roads
in america and replace them in order to do this, leaving immobility for
years. Just think about that. Unless, we just made the solar roadways right
by the roads we ALREADY have, that would be smarter, so nevermind
everything I just said.
“The economy is in the toilet.” Yeah I agree. And if it is, then there’s no
possible way we can do this. They haven’t gotten enough donations to paint
the state of Kansas (My state) with these Solar roadways.
PS, this idea is just brainwash. You see what kind of audience this guy is
targeting? I’m very truly sorry to say it, but they’re just targeting the
gullible pop-culture audience. I know you people aren’t dumb, But all this
invention is doing is calling you all freakin dumbasses. Don’t waste your
money on this.
Barnibus Snaples says:
December 30, 2014 at 12:59 am (UTC 0)
I’m disappointed how close-minded people are in these comments. “It would
never work in Finland so it’s never going to work ANYWHERE!!!” What if I
told you 30 years ago there would be phones you could take almost anywhere
that connect wirelessly with towers and you replied “how can that work
where I live in the mountains? The signal would never get through the
mountains! What about rural india? Or sparsely populated areas where a
tower wouldn’t be economical? It’s never going to work!” That sounds silly,
right? Well, so do half the arguments in these comments.
bonza haja says:
December 30, 2014 at 1:25 am (UTC 0)
Bitchez plz. This will never work. Welcome to Finland, Sweden, Norway,
northern Russia, Canada. No sun, only ice and 2m snow. couple of million
people driving with studded (??,aka;winter) tires.This doesn’t work. I hope
you people wake up before anyone puts a dollar on this b*shit. And glass
doesn’t hold the weight of 5 big tractors.
Maria C. says:
December 30, 2014 at 1:27 am (UTC 0)
Solar FREAKIN’ Roadways!: http://youtu.be/qlTA3rnpgzU
This would be awesome!
Mark Stolzoff says:
December 30, 2014 at 1:57 am (UTC 0)
Only Americans would put solar under something. These folks
don’t know how solar works. Shading is a major issue in photovoltaics. A
single pole – an antenna, for instance – casting a shadow across an array
can ruin its output. You see, the current is only as strong as the weakest
cell. If one cell is not producing much current (such as when it is
shaded), it reduces the entire output of the string. The last thing you
want to do is put PV panels under cars. Put the cars under the panels, duh.
Roads serve a purpose. These folks don’t know how roads
work, either. Roads serve several purposes, and the guy who did this video
has saved me a lot of time by explaining almost everything. As he points
out, there’s a reason why we don’t makes roads out of tiles. One issue he
does not cover is noise; roads are also made to be quiet – and sometimes to
be loud (when you want people driving slowly, for instance). Solar Roadways
will always be loud. (Especially when your car goes screeching off the road
in the rain.)
We already have the solar we need. Here’s the part that that
is worth
fighting against the most. Admittedly, the popular video for the idea was
not made by the company, but by some fans. Still, it shows a solar roof and
speaks of “lifeless, boring solar panels” and adds, “This isn’t about
filling a field with solar panels, wasting land.” Great, so once again we
have entrepreneurs telling the public and politicians not to start building
what we have, but to wait for some future breakthrough.
Conservatives Are Destroying Our Future says:
December 30, 2014 at 2:07 am (UTC 0)
Should we as a nation invest in this technology?
Learn more about Solar Roadways: http://www.solarroadways.com
Galfonz says:
December 30, 2014 at 2:12 am (UTC 0)
This can’t work. I’ve seen several explanations as to why. They’ve managed
to scam Popular Science (or maybe payed them off), but don’t believe it.
Don’t ever “invest” in this. No matter how slick the presentation, it won’t
work. Don’t get scammed.
Simon Anthony says:
December 30, 2014 at 2:33 am (UTC 0)
It is marvelous that this technology is being so hotly debated. It is long
past time that actual thought goes in to our continued technological
progress regarding sustainability. I want more of what I have got and Solar
is about the only way to get it and keep us all alive at the same time.
Addressing the all the questions in this thread will get the job done bit
by bit.
Tom Bazuka says:
December 30, 2014 at 2:46 am (UTC 0)
+Pilot Pilotkin haha *yeah mate really anyone can do it! guys I found
amazing trick! did extra 400$ so far today easy!* I mean just watch this
video: #XHZw9RdPNEA
and see how easy that was <333
Christopher Bajor says:
December 30, 2014 at 3:16 am (UTC 0)
Should we as a nation invest in this technology? #ClimateChange
Learn more about Solar Roadways: http://www.solarroadways.com
Dr Tune says:
December 30, 2014 at 3:28 am (UTC 0)
It sounds crazy… but the more you look at this idea the crazier it is.
The FAQ and ‘numbers’ sections on their site don’t really answer the
serious questions (power distribution and storage, keeping them clean,
actual measured efficiency – BTW they say they got a grant in 2009 to
study+test this… but then don’t reveal their results). There’s a lot
of hand-waving-away of numerous fatal flaws in the concept. If you read
the FAQ they talk about connecting every inch of roadway “to the grid”
(errr.. say what?) for “virtual storage” (nice buzzword but…?) and then
..flywheels? what? . It just all falls apart when you look at any number
of practical cost+efficiency issues. As TmluZXM observes in these comments
below this whole thing is being driven by people who think “…it’d be
suuuuper cool you guys!”. …Sure it would, but Solar Freakin Roadways is
never, ever going to happen because it’s a ridiculously impractical idea.
Come back in 5-10 years and see how far this silliness gets in the real
world.
Swixcap says:
December 30, 2014 at 4:10 am (UTC 0)
THIS THING IS THE SHIT! FUCK EVERY IDIOT WHO DISAGREES.
I start like that to get some attention. You are not idiots, just ignorant.
Please, people of Youtube—smartypants, idiots and anyone in
between—please DO NOT blow off this idea! A huge amount of comments here
blows this off as an unrealistic, hyped up video meant to brainwash
gullible dreamers into giving them money for a hopeless project. Yes, that
is the purpose of this video—getting support and spreading the word (and
boy did they succeed in spreading the word!)—of course it is! The world
runs on money. But I beg you all: Do not turn your back to this and reject
the possibility; this is a great IDEA!
The problem with new (great) ideas is that people judge them based on their
current view of the world. “The microelectronics in a million of these
tiles are too fucking expensive for this to ever be a reality!” – No, it
won’t be! It is now, but it WILL not be. The world changes, technology
improves and society evolves, and what was once considered unrealistically
“high-tech” or expensive is now reality! Please look at this as an
idea—it is the beginning, the prototype, the introduction! It is the
first ever mobile phone that weighed 5 kg/12 lbs and cost a butt-load to
make–type of product! It is the 100 kg and 1 MB storage space, first ever
memory card–type of thing! Where are those products today? How important
are they, how big are they, and what do they COST? Think about that, and
then try to evaluate this idea.
How much do you enjoy crushing, “down-voting”, other peoples ideas? Is it
worth crushing this revolutionary, possibly world-changing idea, just to
make you feel better about yourself? Instead of criticizing its faults, why
not help solving them? With support, this CAN become a realistic,
economically feasible, world-changing product!
Debby Bruck says:
December 30, 2014 at 4:37 am (UTC 0)
SOLAR TECHNOLOGY: 100 Greatest Innovations of 2014. The possibilities are
infinite. I’d like to learn more and about the elements and materials
needed to put this into place. It may start small in a pilot project, but
could it be integrated into the entire country? I’m concerned about LIGHT
POLLUTION. How does this effect plants and animals?
Theo van der Meulen says:
December 30, 2014 at 4:51 am (UTC 0)
Solar Freakin’ Roadways… what is it?!
TheTriforceKid says:
December 30, 2014 at 5:48 am (UTC 0)
Here is how these would be perfectly viable in the long run.
Snow and Ice obscuring the panels: While these panels ~do~ require
sunlight to be effective, you must take into consideration that it is not
always snowy/icy ~everywhere, all the time~. This means that the heating
elements for the roads would only need to be activated when the ground
temperature reaches freezing, which means that these panels would only
generate heat when it’s ~needed~, and therefore mitigates the cost of
heating the panels tremendously. If these were built in some place where
the ground temperature is ~always~ below freezing, then, no, it wouldn’t be
cost-effective.
“You’d need to rip up and replace ALL of the roads”: Not true. The
shoulder of most highways would be ~perfect~ places to start this off
without grinding traffic to a complete halt. We wouldn’t have to tear up
huge swaths of roadways to put these in place, either, as the most popular
post on this post by akagi33370 seems to state. I’m pretty sure that, in
the long run, people would be willing to part with a little bit of tax
money to buy that new Iphone if their electric bill was steadily reduced by
the use of these solar roadways to generate energy at a much lower cost
than it does to burn fossil fuels and fuck up the ozone and atmosphere even
more.
Pollution: These panels are made from mostly recycled materials, which
means that less of our plastic/glass garbage would end up in a landfill.
This means landfills would actually have an incentive to recycle as much
glass, plastic, and precious metals as possible. Hell, the State could
even give the Landfills a kickback for recycling as much material as
possible. Face it, we’re ~all~ sick to death of seeing landfills taking up
valuable space that could be used for other endeavors.
The Immobility argument: This argument is pretty invalid when you think
about it critically. The idea that we’d suddenly have to replace all of
our roadways at the same time is just plain stupid. Nobody in their right
mind would say “Well, we need to make solar roadways RIGHT NOW. Tear up
EVERYTHING and get to work on that!” Like with ~any~ roadway construction,
there is always a plan to divert traffic to other routes so as to mitigate
traffic congestion as much as possible. Nobody tears up an entire stretch
of highway all at once. They tear out half of it, rebuild that half while
traffic goes about it’s merry business on the other side of the road, and
then the traffic, once that bit of road is finished, is moved to the other,
finished side of the road so that work on the unfinished section of road
can be finished without, once again, hindering traffic ~too~ much. This is
basic stuff in terms of road construction.
Water runoff: Face it..we’ve all had those moments where we watch perfectly
useable rain-water run off into culverts to be passed down river and into
the ocean, where it would be useless to anyone, and thought “This is
stupid..that’s all perfectly good water that just needs a bit of
purification in order to be recycled into drinking water. We’re in a
drought, and all this rain we’re getting is being wasted needlessly”. The
runoff of everyday thunderstorms could be sent directly to
reclamation/treatment facilities where it could then be treated and put
back into the community water supply, thus mitigating the need to preserve
water in times of drought. (We could also argue that systems could be put
in place to pump treated water back into water basins, thus refilling our
drying lakes, but that’s another argument for another topic)
Energy consumption: LED’s do not use a lot of power, and can be made to be
~very~ bright in comparison to halogen bulbs. Even if a solar panel only
generated half the energy it used, it would still generate more energy than
a standard street light, which doesn’t generate ~any~ energy, only uses
it. And since most solar-powered devices use a chargeable battery system,
these lights wouldn’t be susceptible to things like downed power lines,
which cut power completely to entire neighborhoods. Even if the entire
city went dark, with solar Roadways, you’d still be able to see the lines
on the road because they store energy and are only in use at night. The
only problem I can see with this is that they’d have to make it so that
these roadways would be smart enough to distinguish natural, solar light
from, say, the light generated by headlights. so that the lights don’t shut
off when cars drive over them at night.
PRessure-sensetive warning systems: These would be very handy. Can you
imagine the pedestrian traffic deaths that could be prevented if there was
a system in place that warned drivers that there was something obstructing
the road ahead of you? How many times have we heard this statement? “He
came out of nowhere! I had no time to react!”? If there were a warning
system embedded in the roadways to notify drivers that there is an animal
or person in the road ahead, it would prevent many traffic accidents
involving wild animals and people alike. And while it’s not fool-proof, it
would cut down on traffic accidents involving animals and pedestrians. OF
course, they’d have to figure out how to make it so that the roadways, once
again, would be “Smart” enough to distinguish, say, a motorcycle from a
moose.
If we can put a man on the moon (And soon to be on Mars in the next
20-something years), then I am quite certain we can come up with a way to
make Solar Roadways viable.
Reddit Gold User says:
December 30, 2014 at 6:41 am (UTC 0)
I did some math to calculate how much it would cost to melt the snow in the
state of New York in 2013 and compared it to the 2013 NY snow removal costs:
$20,000,000(NY 2013 snow removal cost [NY DOT] Budget was $30M)
9,656km roadway in NY(NY DOT), or 9,656,000 meters
4.6m average roadway width in US(closest figure I could get, it should
reasonably be wider in NY)
9,656km = 9,656,000m
9,656,000m * 4.6m = 44,417,600 m^2 of roadway in NY
$0.208 per kWh electricity in NY(current rate)
NY received .61m of snow last year(equal to .061m of ice…easier to work
with ice)
.061m * 44,417,600m^2 = 2,709,473 m^3 ice
Ice weighs 919kg per m^3
2,709,473 m^3 * 919kg = 2,490,005,687 kg
2,490,005,687kg * 334(kj/kg to melt ice) = 831,661,899,458kj = total
kilojoules to melt the ice
831,661,899,458 kj = 231,017,194 kWh
231,017,194kWh * $0.208 = *$48,051,576 not including labor.*
In 2013 *We only spent $20M* of the $30M budget. The $48M also assumes that
100% of the energy will go toward melting the snow, which is
unrealistically optimistic. You’re looking at a number that could easily
triple the cost of traditional snow removal.
Joseph Martins says:
December 30, 2014 at 6:55 am (UTC 0)
I do wish anyone who mentions electric cars would also mention their huge
negative environmental impact. A new electric car uses 110 pounds of
graphite, hybrid cars around 22 lbs, and even e-bikes use a couple of
pounds. When it comes time to replace those batteries…another 110
pounds…
Graphite production is a massive environmental issue in China — we’re
talking environmental destruction on a very large scale….Google it.
Solar surfaces are an interesting concept. Electric anything that requires
massive batteries, not so much.
TmluZXM says:
December 30, 2014 at 7:32 am (UTC 0)
It seems to be that there are two people in the debate of Solar Freakin
Roadways. Those who dislike the idea, who use logic, reason and mathematics
to explain their side of the argument. And those who like the idea, who use
their FEEEEELINGS and the fact that it would be SUPER COOL YOU GUUUUUYS to
explain their feelings and the fact that it would be super cool you guys.
bejbejbej1 says:
December 30, 2014 at 8:03 am (UTC 0)
forget what people are telling you, unless it’s backed up by evidence.
Anyway straight to the point.
Pros:
Everything said in this video is true.
Netherlands have already started using these!
Cons:
1) it’s VERY expensive to do this. I’m talking 70 metres = 3million euros
or $3.7million. (unless technology improves i.e. robots,different materials
used and more effeciently and faster)
2) It takes a very long time to do this! it would take decades to finish up
an entire city unless the technology itself improves to make them (robots,
mechanics, engineering and technology) faster somehow.
Biggest Pro:
point of solar road panels. even if it took 300 years (assuming technology
will improve greatly) to remove roads and build SRs across the entire
world, it has VERY VERY great long term sustainable advantages for our
earth.
those 3 centuries is nothing compared to millions of years.
Biggest Con:
You would need enormous amount of material and Time! I mean…..a…lot..!
Joshua Roberts says:
December 30, 2014 at 8:24 am (UTC 0)
absurd from an engineering standpoint in terms of efficacy and cost,
naturally trendies lap it up because they have never used matlab in their
lives and know nothing of materials engineering, composition or degradation
realities. “ALL OUR PROBLEMS WILL BE SOLVESEDED!” wake up morons, all your
energy comesfrom hydrocarbons and nuclear and the NWO has done its very
best to ensure these industries are as dirty and manipulated as possible –
rather than offsetting the environmental impact of fracking by starting
water remediation companies though, you rub your edicks dreaming of solar
roadways… christ you are all so gullible its sad.
ronc1357 says:
December 30, 2014 at 9:02 am (UTC 0)
After doing a little more digging I found this, some real world
informantion about how much energy it would take to melt the snow on
roadways.
Indiana Warm Floors, Heated Driveway / Snow-melt ~ CLP Marketing, Angola
According to this company (that is doing this using hot water), it takes
about 150 btus per square foot to melt snow at the rate of 1″ of snowfall
per hour.
I did and online btu to watt conversion calculator and this equals
43.962… watts per square foot. I calculated that solar roadways panels
are 4 square feet each (parking lot they built used 108 solar road panels,
the parking lot is 12′ X 36′ that equals 4 square feet per panel).
This means that each panel would need 175.848 watts to melt a snow fall of
one inch per hour.
For the 12′ X 36′ parking lot it would take 18,991.584 watts per hour to
keep up with that amount of snow fall.
Solar Roadways claim that their roadway with 100% solar panel coverage will
produce a maximum of 5,600 watts for their solar freakin parking lot, which
is about 3 and a half times less energy than it needs to produce in an
ideal situation to melt the snow (right now they say it only produces 3200
watts because of the 69% solar cell coverage).
darkknightamg986 says:
December 30, 2014 at 9:57 am (UTC 0)
Love the idea. LOTS of hurdles to overcome, but the idea is a great one.
Frankly, it’s probably too far ahead of its time since the technology
hasn’t caught up to it.
So many people are saying it won’t work, the technology isn’t there, you
can’t make it cost effective… Yes, you are right, it isn’t yet but the
vision is there.
Eruanna de Malfurion says:
December 30, 2014 at 10:50 am (UTC 0)
So many people with such narrow minds. Comes of the brainwashing in public
schools, I’m guessing. That or many “people” posting here are paid reps of
oil companies.
Now for the video: The costs AT PRESENT DAY of replacing all the paved
highways is simply not feasible, but who knows about some future date. We
are getting closer to replication tech every day (provided we don’t permit
the U.S. to start WW3 -can you imagine what a TRILLION dollars PER YEAR of
funding could do instead of murder people all over the world?).
However, for urban applications this definitely has merit. The Netherlands
is running a test case bike-path (70m already functioning) to see how well
a similar product holds up. These panels under sidewalks and bike paths
with the ability to melt snow would be very useful in high-density areas.
It could be extended to urban roadways where the cost of “cleanup” after
severe storms would entice governments to get the cables underground. The
economic cost to shutting down business for days to weeks after heavy snow
and ice storms in the north is a good persuader. We’ve had three recent
severe storms here in Canada that cost millions of dollars in clean-up
alone, to say nothing of the damaged economy in those places. Parts of
DOWNTOWN Calgary had no power for a week.
For those people crying bitterly about how roof solar is “so much better”
why one or the other??? Is it so very difficult for your tiny brains to
consider multiple options? Why not put them on roofs for the electricity
generation (and get rid of coal plants) AS WELL??? There are also now
applications of transparent solar cells embedded into glass for windows,
with the additional benefit of turning more opaque during hot summer days,
passively cooling the house. You know all those shiny glass/mirror
buildings in downtowns? Yup, potential massive solar collectors. Imagine
roof top gardens on all our apartment buildings with greenhouse roofs of
transparent solar. The “cost” of therapy for people who live in our hideous
concrete hells where there are 5 months of winter could probably pay for
replacing every sidewalk alone, lol.
For those who want to make massive generating stations, look to the
problems that some are already having. Deserts may have great sunlight, but
do you really want transmission towers using up the land we need for
growing food? Not to mention they’re an eyesore, and huge amounts of power
is lost transporting the electricity over the vast distances. Makes more
sense to create power locally.
My only real concern with all this technology are the chemicals and
production methods that go in to the making of the panels. If we “save” the
Earth from pollution created by petrochemicals by replacing it with toxic
crap we dump into the environment from production of “green” techs, we’ve
not really accomplished much, and could even be worse off.
[edited for spelling]
Jake Penner says:
December 30, 2014 at 11:17 am (UTC 0)
All the roads wouldn’t have to be completely ripped out. They could be
replaced with the solar roadway once that section of road needs to be
repaved or replaced. Heck highway crews are constantly ripping out enormous
sections of highway all the time. Sounds like a fairly simple solution. The
cost up front would be high but the savings a few years down the road would
be astronomical.