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The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

sciencealert.com

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Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#331

Post by BubRoss »

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #243
duck2 wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can deduce something from your current knowledge, you don't need to do an experiment for that. Certainly people knew that putting fragile semiconductors under roads isn't the best idea, but they went on and spent time and money. I would call this a waste.

Some people deduced one thing, and others deduced the other thing. There was plenty of excitement about this idea on this very site when it was first proposed. Seeing something once is better than hearing it a hundred times.

What problem does this solve?

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#332

Post by [deleted] »

Someone wrote: post #322
Retric wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except we don't actually need that much solar power and ground based installation is really cheap. Further road surfaces need to be transparent for solar to work, handle high loads, channel water off the surface, and provide lots of friction in a wide rang of weather conditions. It’s an extremely difficult problem, but solving it without massive reduction in panel costs is kind of pointless.

Define “need”. If five billion people want to live as Americans live now, and Americans will all have flying cars (1), go on holiday in space stations, etc, and we want to put back the carbon of a few cubic miles of oil in the ground each year to fight climate change, what we “need” will be quite different from what we think it is now. If solar cells become essentially free, we _could_ get there. Also ”ground based i…

[deleted]

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#333

Post by dx7tnt »

emj wrote: post #304
voxl wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lets see the easily falsified napkin math then

EVblog has some great videos about how bad solar roadways are, starting in 2014, and a good recap video in 2017 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpwx-8s1M38

Yeah EEVBlog Dave is really not keen on solar roadways... It does seem like an over-engineered solution to a problem that isn't really there.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#334

Post by mikeash »

ijiiijji1 wrote: post #204
mikeash wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of worse places. On top of airliners, for example, or inside active coal mines.

Under airliners seems even worse.

I know, put them on the turbine blades.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#335

Post by arcticbull »

ksec wrote: post #328
__sy__ wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And some aren't even worth trying in the first place. Like this idea. edit: I'm all for trying crazy moonshots. Just not down right idiotic ones that are pushed by pseudo-science and clickbait activism [1]. [1] https://www.vox.com/2014/5/14/5717036/should-we-cover-all-ou...

Excuse my ignorance, isn't this a technical challenge, rather than the idea in itself was stupid? Isn't that saying shooting sky full of satellite for communication is stupid until SpaceX made loading anything to space 10x less expensive? I would say the idea isn't worth trying because it clearly wasn't ready, ( I mean if napkin maths already show it is off by a factor of 10 than it really is stupid trying it ) but I…

The thing about solar roads is they're covered by cars, and they don't work when covered, for obvious reasons. Then all the road dirt, grime, tire dust, oil, etc, builds up on top of them blocking the light for good. The road is about the worst thing you can possibly try and generate solar electricity from.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#336

Post by Can_Not »

zdragnar wrote: post #327
atq2119 wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a standard maximum height for vehicles that is taken into account for freeway bridges, so your first argument is nonsense. The rest still stands, of course. If you absolutely do want to put solar panels in the same place as cars, starting with parking lots is clearly a better idea. Fewer problems with high speed collisions, the electricity is generated closer to where it's needed, and people will be thankful…

"Nonsense" would only apply if practice were as good as theory; a very very brief Google search will net plenty of results for freeway overpasses and pedestrian bridges being hit. One example: https://www.cbs58.com/news/truck-wedged-under-bridge-shuts-d...

This isn't really a criticism of the core idea to just say "what if somebody built it stupidly low", traffic lights have been fine my entire life and maybe some highways will have to be skipped or doubled for NASA/ military purposes.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#337

Post by ksec »

arcticbull wrote: post #335
ksec wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excuse my ignorance, isn't this a technical challenge, rather than the idea in itself was stupid? Isn't that saying shooting sky full of satellite for communication is stupid until SpaceX made loading anything to space 10x less expensive? I would say the idea isn't worth trying because it clearly wasn't ready, ( I mean if napkin maths already show it is off by a factor of 10 than it really is stupid trying it ) but I…

The thing about solar roads is they're covered by cars, and they don't work when covered, for obvious reasons. Then all the road dirt, grime, tire dust, oil, etc, builds up on top of them blocking the light for good. The road is about the worst thing you can possibly try and generate solar electricity from.

Thx. Valid Point.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#338

Post by fencepost »

fyfy18 wrote: post #295
fencepost wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a proof of concept trial it wasn't very expensive. Unrelated, but just for comparison it cost about a much as Uber lost every 2.5 hours in 2019Q2. They built a Minimum Viable Product for a trial and found out that it wasn't actually viable and didn't provide the hoped for value. They probably also learned a lot with real world experience (that they wouldn't have been sure to have in a staged setup) and may come ba…

Have there been any trials on creating a solar roof over highways? It seems like a much better option as the panels don't need to be reinforced, and they can be angled towards the sun to aid cleaning. We already know how to build stable metal framed structures (and panels aren't that heavy). In somewhere like Spain it would reduce the requirement for AC while driving, making it even more green. During rain it would i…

If you're building new structures I'm positive that the economics work out better for simply doing separate solar farms. Building them above a road has no major advantages and potentially both increases construction costs and increases the chances of unfortunate interaction (eg an accident taking out panels).

The sweet spot for solar roads would be in places where the generation benefit outweighed the extra cost when a road was being redone anyway - and even then only if the materials were up to the task.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#339

Post by lucid00 »

I'm not sure I'd put "doesn't generate enough energy" in the failure category.

It's a road. It normally doesn't generate energy anyway.

Anything here is a plus, especially when it comes to research.

They just have to take what they've learned from this and apply it to the next attempt.

And from the sounds of it, the only thing they have to really focus on is ensure the next one lasts long enough to pay for its own construction.

Solar sidewalks might be a better idea.

Re: The first solar road has turned out to be a disappointing failure

#340

Post by tinco »

zimpenfish wrote: post #303
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do wonder if the concept could work on a sidewalk, given that they aren't being perpetually driven over by 3,000+ pound vehicles.

There's a solar bike path in Holland which did pretty well. Exceeded expected yield the first two years but then dropped back to slightly under. https://en.solaroad.nl/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/prf1-ENG-S...

It didn't do well, they just marketed the failure as a success, and they were at scamming a different municipality for a follow up 'experiment'.

Why can't they just work on something that makes sense?

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