14 DAY TRIAL // Just days from now, the Netherlands will unveil the world's first solar bike path. That's right, this country is now hard at work putting together a bike patch that can harvest sun energy. Whatever power is produced in this manner will serve to keep street lights up and running.
Admittedly, that path will not cough out all that much power. Then again, this project is less about cutting energy costs or anything of the sorts, and more about showing that technology can help us improve our ecological footprint while going about business as usual.
Introducing the first solar bike path ever
As detailed by Inhabitat, this green-oriented project boils down to turning a 70-meter (230-feet) stretch of the bike path connecting Amsterdam's Krommenie and Wormerveer suburbs into a one-of-a-kind road that has solar cells included in its makeup.
It's important to note that this bike path between Krommenie and Wormerveer has about 2,000 cyclists, both children and adults, traveling up and down its lanes on a daily basis. Simply put, it's insanely popular.
To have the 70-meter stretch turned into the world's first solar bike path, workers embedded solar cells into concrete slabs, which they then covered in a layer of tempered glass. Thanks to a slight tilt and a non-adhesive finish, the resulting road will forever stay clean.
Information shared with the public says that, all in all, the costs associated with implementing this project amounted to roughly €3 million ($3.74 million). It is understood that the local authorities provided most of the funding.
It is estimated that, when unveiled and put to work harvesting sun energy, this eco-friendly bike path in the Netherlands will produce about as much energy as three regular households require. This is because, when embedded in the concrete slabs, the solar cells lost some 30% of their efficiency.
Not the end of the road
The folks behind this project imagine that, at one point in the future, solar cells will be part and parcel of many other bike paths around the world, maybe even roads and highways. Thus, electric cars could one day get their power from the very roads they are driven on.
“Wouldn’t it be nice if our roads act like solar panels? And if we could drive our vehicles with the solar power generated by this?” ask the green energy enthusiasts behind SolarRoad.
According to specialists with Dutch research institute TNO, about 20% of the 140,000 kilometers (nearly 87,000 miles) of roads in the Netherlands have the potential to be transformed into energy-generating pieces of infrastructure.
