More power on the road
US company New Energy Technologies remains tight-lipped over its energy transfer innovation.
wasted road energy
Like it or not, when your car drives down the street it wastes power.
A fair whack of energy is lost in the form of sound and heat from the motor. The shock absorbers have to cope with upward and downward motion that could otherwise be used to propel the vehicle forward.
Now a US company is proposing a way to capture some of that lost energy and use it to power road infrastructure.
New Energy Technologies is tight-lipped about exact details, but its energy capture system seems to rely on similar principles to regenerative braking. Special road plates are fitted into major thoroughfares and are able to capture kinetic energy from cars slowing down at lights, entering a drive-through restaurant or braking at the end of a hill. It’s likely dynamos – devices that convert motion into an electric current – would be used to create electricity to power lights, toll booths and even restaurants.
Similar projects are under consideration to capture the energy from human footfalls.
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