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http://www.curbed.com/2017/2/6/14521102/highway-the-ray-solar-power-transportation From the article:
Highways have never been the sexiest infrastructure projects, but Allie Kelly, the executive director of The Ray, believes that preconception will shift dramatically over the next few years due to rapid technological shifts. With politicians in Washington discussing the administration's ambitious infrastructure plans, now is the time to make investments in our transportation system. As far as Kelly is concerned, that vision should focus on achieving zero deaths, zero carbon, and zero waste. She hopes The Ray can serve as the laboratory where new ideas and revenue models are tried, tested, and proven possible.
"We're at a tipping point in transportation," says Kelly. "In five to ten years, we won't remember a time when we invested a dime in infrastructure spending for a road that only did one thing."
[...] Initially, the vision for The Ray was to add a solar installation in the median, along with a wildflower garden, to remind drivers about the environmental costs of the transportation system. But the results of the study suggested a more dramatic plan was needed. Since then, The Ray, in concert with the Georgia Department of Transportation, has slowly rolled out a number of new initiatives to improve both safety and sustainability. In 2015, a new electric charging station powered in part by photovoltaic panels, a joint project with funding from Kia Motors, became the first in the state.
This past year, the Ray added a strip of Wattway solar panels to an entrance ramp, and installed a WheelWright tire pressure sensor at a rest stop right next to the Alabama state line. The new British device helps drivers quickly test and maintain proper tire pressure, a leading cause of crashes.
Over the next year, the foundation plans to add more new tests that will help build out a more holistic roadway. A one megawatt solar installation will be installed in a right-of-way as part of a joint effort with Georgia Power to turn the highway into a place for power generation, and a series of bioswales—landscaped drainage ditches that naturally filter pollution—will turn the areas adjacent to the highway into more clean, sustainable, and natural landscapes.
"We're pushing the idea that these kind of installations can become widespread energy generation system for state departments of transportation," says Kelly. "Highways can eventually make money, and even serve as a power grid for the future."
Previous stories on solar roads and pathways:
Solar Generating Roads
SolaRoad Cycle Path Electricity Yield Exceeds Expectations
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Thursday February 09 2017, @01:22AM
At least in terms of cost and effort it's about the same deal.
No. This:
https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fthumbs.dreamstime.com%2Fz%2Fsolar-panel-farm-panels-outdoor-field-sunny-day-63803489.jpg&f=1 [duckduckgo.com]
Is cheaper to do than something even bigger and taller than this:
http://www.burnham-on-sea.com/news/2011/solar-panel-farm-1.jpg [burnham-on-sea.com]
The former is also easier to secure against earthquakes, and stors, and by building it in a field instead of above an interstate highway you also don't have to build against it falling and landing on some car passing by.
And if we stop and think about it, tornados and hurricanes and earthquakes never stop us from building valuable things in that real estate where such things occur, so why would solar panels be any different?
Its not that we are prevented from building them, it that a bunch of panels in a field 10 miles from town in a fenced off solar farm do not have to be held to the same build standards as if they were built OVER the interstate highways.
If a tornado, say, hit then you'd have a lot of debris to clear off the highway anyway, so having solar panels there wouldn't change that too much.
Here I was thinking more in terms of maintenance and repairs. A if a solar farm gets damaged by a storm the whole farm is contained in 1 or 2 sq miles. You send a team out and they fix the damage; odds are you have spare parts in a storage building on the property or nearby warehouse. Odds are you may even have local regular technicians. Contrast this with a storm passing through the state, and now you've got 100 damaged solar panels scattered randomly around the states highway system, half of them 200 miles from anything... including eachother. The same team will take 1000 hours longer to repair the damage just down to transportation and supply logistics. Some infrastructure, like highways, by necessity has to be dispersed in a wide net... but most things tend to be much more economical maintain if they are localized onto dedicate sites.