August 19, 2008

Roads could be a source of power

Anyone will know that when they were children and played outside, the roads during the summer got really hot. This has finally been realised by the science community who believe that this could be a brilliant source of power.

The idea is to lay conductive copper piping before a new asphalt (Black Top) is laid. They also found that the hottest point is around two centimetres below the surface.

Obviously if this does really work, then the copper piping can be replaced with something that is even more conductive. However, whatever is underneath the road, the benefits speak for themselves:

It’s really cheap
They don’t need to find extra land
It’s invisible to the average person
Blacktop stays hot, and could produce power for hours after the sun goes down
There are roads and parking lots everywhere power is needed.

Source [Eco Geek]