France Develops World’s First Solar Powered Road Surface
You might’ve already have heard of ‘Solar Freaking Roadways’ the Indiegogo campaign which received an inordinate amount of attention last year but which honestly was a bunch of bollocks.
While Americans have only made fake viral videos to generate cash, France has gone ahead and started building the real thing – a fully solar powered ‘Highway of the Sun’.
After five years of research with the National Institute of Solar Energy (INES), Colas, a subsidiary of the Bouygues group roadworks has announced the invention of a road surfacing made up of solar cells. The hope is to sell the plan to other nations in next few years.
Far superior to the walkways and solar cycle paths of Amsterdam and Germany, these panels act as a strong and durable surface.
The CEO of Colas, Hervé Le Bouc, explained to French mag Les Echoes that the tiles used (each comprising of a single photovoltaic cell 15 centimetres square) will be glued to the existing road and then coated in resin substrate that can stand trucks and cars:
“There is no need to rebuild infrastructure. This is a road surface marketed as slabs that apply on roads or car parks.At Chambéry and Grenoble, was tested successfully on Wattway a cycle of one million vehicles, or twenty years of normal traffic a road, and the surface does not move.
Simply by using sunlight, a kilometre-long stretch of road can light a town of up to 5,000 inhabitants. Covered a quarter of the country’s roads would, according to Bouc, ensure energy independence for the whole of France. Something that could be achieved as early as 2025.
Protected by two new patents, this unparalleled cutting-edge technique is a major breakthrough, as it provides the road with a new function: producing clean, renewable energy locally, in addition to a road’s conventional use as a vector for mobility.
Bouc claims that since the company was visited by French President Francois Holland last year they have opened more than 1,000 sales offices in 50 countries.
By the end of June they will have completed the training by a trade agency and will start marketing the surfacing – nicknamed ‘The Wattway” to 400 French agencies. It’s able to provide power to street lights, signs, tramways, as well as housing, offices, etc. 20 m² of Wattway can supply enough electricity to power a single home (not including heating).
The hope is to sell the plan to other nations in next few years with most of the interest is coming from North America and Denmark, but if the plan proves effective, the rest of Europe will most likely follow suit.
http://gbpp.org/en/2015/11/11226