The world's first solar-powered road is a bike path that was installed in the Cromagny region of the Netherlands in 2014. Subsequently, a solar-powered bicycle lane was installed in Poland, while the first solar-powered road for vehicles was located in Normandy, France A 5000-person town in the area.
Solar-powered roads in the United States are privately sponsored research, starting with crowdfunding on the Internet and then funded by the transportation department, with installation trials on sidewalks or service areas starting in 2011. Other experiments were conducted in Missouri and Iowa, although also hope to use the road, but so far there is no successful application of the relevant reports.
Using roads to generate electricity is a good idea and a worthwhile experiment, and although not necessarily successful, the benefits once successful will be enormous. According to supporters' calculations, the roads in Paris, if fully covered Solar panels, enough to support electricity consumption in the city of Paris, this idea really touched many people.
However, in an experiment in Iowa, 30-square-meter panels laid along sidewalks still do not provide an hourly drain for the remaining electricity per day, and there is still a long way to go between reality and reality. Road, there are many problems to be solved.
The solar road company gives a list of solar road benefits.
First of all, the solar road should have the same safety as other roads.
In a test conducted by the U.S. Department of Transportation, laboratory solar panels failed the eight-tonne impact test and in another field test in Iowa, some of the solar panel surfaces broke and many started to worry about fragmentation After the sharp surface, will not bring derivative damage.Of course, you can continue to develop new materials to reinforce the strength of the solar panel surface.
However, this is a double-edged sword, which can make it difficult to install solar panels in the field, or difficult to change maintenance in the future, if the material is too stiff or with many additional supporting structures, and in some cases, solar panels Damage beyond the initial expectations of researchers, the replacement is inevitable, and the cost will not exceed the benefits it produces?
Therefore, how to ensure long-term and reliable use, or to ensure convenient and full-life use, is a problem to be solved by the solar road, and more and more products are damaged in the laboratory, and for this reason, Freeways made of solar energy roads, the world will be extremely rare.
Second, the solar road power output cost how?
In some usage comparisons, the 1-kWh cost of a solar bike lane is more than 12 times that of a solar panel installed on the roof, and solar panels installed on the road are uncompetitive if the price can not drop. It's not hard to get a 12-meter-wide solar panel on the road side like a street lamp on a 12-meter-wide road, and even more, its reliability and longevity should be much higher due to no contact with the vehicle. Also use the road space power generation, so is not it more cost-effective?
Solar panels make the pavement, the direction of which faces the sun will be limited by the slope of the road will not be the best angle.Also, in order to increase the strength of solar panels, will be added to the surface of some reinforced materials, may be more solid, Will lead to lower light conversion rate of the panel, the price will be lower.
Third, can the solar road withstand long-term environmental changes?
The solar panels are also exposed to bad weather such as snow, heavy rains, icing and, of course, thermal expansion and contraction, as well as rolling on a variety of vehicles and laying around the panels Materials, thermal expansion and contraction pressure. Long-term repeated squeeze, how the panel is not damaged it?
In the foreign test, some will do a good job of drainage, and some will do well with the surrounding materials properly connected, but even so, there are solar panels because of water damage, and even some of the solar panels due to Spontaneous combustion occurs due to environmental changes.
The photovoltaic pavement (called 'Wattway') developed by the French infrastructure company (Colas), a 1 kilometer long road, is located in a town of 5,000 people.
Laying on the pavement, there is a fire hazard solar panels.
For the solar energy road, the current commentary has the approval and the criticism.It is worth trying to explore if such a new thing can be progressively promoted and the careful investment.
However, if it is to be used directly on the freeway, across laboratories and friendly test roads, the problems to be assessed are not only the above difficulties, but also other problems, such as the more difficult in bicycle lanes and service areas Safety issues to be solved, traffic safety at high speeds and safe use of heavy-vehicle high-speed impacts, and so on.
The birth of new things, always questioned, but still to encourage those substantive innovations, and the formal first in the world, is not the essence of innovation.
