Jan 05 2009
The Road to Cleaner Energy
Driving your car may become a guilt-free pasttime once again if an Israeli inventor manages to turn roads into generators that can recharge clean electric vehicles.
How's that? Haim Abramovich, an engineer at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, came up with the novel idea of embedding road surfaces with special piezoelectric crystals that convert pressure from the weight and vibration of passing cars into electricity. The crystals could be applied during normal road maintenance, eliminating the need for special construction.
If all goes according to theory, a one-kilometer stretch of four-lane highway could produce up to 400 kilowatts, reportedly enough energy to run eight Ford Fiestas. One unknown is whether the new road surface will slow down cars in some way, reducing net energy production.
Abramovich's Haifa-based spin-off firm, Innowattech, plans to test the system on a short stretch of road in Northern Israel this month. The firm also hopes to apply the same technology to railroads and airport runways.
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