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posted by CoolHand on Tuesday July 07 2015, @07:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the are-you-*sure*-that-will-scale-up? dept.

Converting the energy of a moving automobile into an efficient power source for that same automobile is one of the Holy Grails of motor transport, and new research suggests an important part of the solution could be to look at the friction generated between car tyres and the road itself.

Engineers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US have developed a nanogenerator that’s capable of harvesting the energy produced by the friction of a tyre rolling along the ground.

For those aren't going to RTFA no matter what: Their test vehicle was a toy car, so I've got some concerns about whether or not this will scale up to full-sized models. But if it does, it could potentially vast increase the range of electric cars, or allow them to use smaller batteries.


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  • (Score: 2) by toygeek on Tuesday July 07 2015, @10:20PM

    by toygeek (28) on Tuesday July 07 2015, @10:20PM (#206250) Homepage

    By the way if you read the article, the energy comes not from friction, but from the electricity generated by the rubber hitting the road, a static charge if I recall correctly.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @10:39PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2015, @10:39PM (#206257)

    The energy in the electricity ultimately comes from fuel for the engine in the vehicle. No way to get around the law of thermodynamics. Or conservation of energy. Or physics in general. Otherwise we'd all have invisible flying cars.