here

Presumably the car has to expend more energy to get over the ramp though?

It has to, unless hes discovered a way to create energy from nothing!

Ian

It seems these would only work on very busy intersections, though. Unless the power is used up very slowly so a few car passes could generate power for hours.

I imagine it's stored, so, for example, when the lights are green, many cars will pass over the ramp generating electricity. I also suppose that for low-traffic areas, a number of ramps could be placed in a row.

In any case, a very innovative and wise idea! Especially when you consider what currently happens during blackouts!

I German teenager had a similar idea - instead of such a ramp for cars he wanted to use plates on a sidewalk. People walking on the sidewalk would cause the plates to move up and down generating power.

Apparently plates like that being put into place in Central London.

But creating energy isn't a true-or-false thing in this case, true when car-driving-over-ramp and false when car-driving-normally. Car-driving-normally creates plenty of energy.

£25,000 each? Someone's gonna get a hefty check from the government!

I don't know about the design... they ought to be turned the other way, so you go "up" the ramp, pushing it down with each row of tires. Rather than hitting the ramp from the "back", wearing on the tires. I read that it'll be safe for cars, but hitting those ramps from the back all day ought to make for some wear and tear.

But for the cost you'd think small generators would work better, cost less to install, and take less work to install... and be far less noticeable; fewer changes to the whole driving experience, all adding up to a more seamless integration.

Interesting nonetheless.

Yeah that's true, if it faced the other way round it would take only a tiny tiny amount of extra energy from the car since its weight alone would push it down, and that could drive a piston or whatever.

I suspect they're designed to work both ways, so that vehicles can drive either way over them. In Sheffield for example emergency vehicles drive on the opposite side of the road to overtake on a frequent basis, they can't have obstructions on the road that would damage the vehicle. The photo probably shows them going over the ramp the "wrong" way. I can't imagine they'd work the "wrong" way around.

I think I saw this on Midlands Today or something because a car park is going to be using them to power streetlamps.

If you think about it, the car is not climbing any "slope" when it goes over the ramp (the car's weight pushes one side of the ramp down at a time - the ramp is not static). There is therefore no extra energy required by the car to go over it.

And probably defeating the whole point.

Quite a clever idea really, good idea to cut energy usage.

You can't create energy full stop, that would be impossible. All you can do is transform it from one type into another.

All it is doing is taking kinetic energy from the car wheels (which got the energy from the combustion of fuel). Into kinetic energy that turns the generator on the ramp.

I don't know about you but I sometimes go through green lights at 30 mph. I wouldn't want to hit one of those things at that speed the 'back' way.

Well you're lucky, i doubt they would use such modern technology over there.



But i have to agree if it gets stuck it could look a little dangerous, wouldn't it work the other way or as a curve too though?

Yeah, a curve would work better for bi-directional traffic. But they wouldn't want to lay one across the road; if they could pull it off they'd want one for each side of each car, so each car = 4 presses -- front tires each hit one, then the back tires hit the same two. So in a four-lane road with 2 lanes in each direction, you'd have 8 of these, at least.

Theoretically speaking you could gut all the roads and put them everywhere to generate a lot of power... but that might take time, cost more than it's worth, and make for a bit of a bumpy ride, I'd imagine.

As far as having the ramps backwards... you don't see them very often over here due to liability reasons, but every now and then you'll see one-way spikes. Drive over them one way and they get pushed down; the other way, they rip out your tires. I can't imagine how a place can have those in this day and age; surely they'd be liable for damages, but I have seen them in the past. Installed, not the spike strips police lay out to stop speeders.