They may curb lead foots, but speed-bumps sure seem like shock-rattling, undercarriage-scraping annoyances designed to demolish your car's suspension.
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But New Energy Technologies begs to differ. The Maryland-based company has designed some speed bumps that motorists should be happy to drive over.
Besides slowing down speed demons, as cars and trucks drive over the company's MotionPower strips, kinetic energy from the vehicles is harvested and converted into electricity. New Energy Technologies envisions the devices powering street and building lights, roadway signs and potentially electronics and appliances in homes and buildings.
The company recently displayed the MotionPower strip at the Roanoke Civic Center in Virginia where stopped vehicles lit up a series of lights. According to New Energy Technologies, 580 cars drove over a MotionPower strip in a 6-hour span and generated enough electricity to power an average U.S. home for one day.
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The company says the strips would be best suited for installation where vehicles are traveling faster than 15 mph and are slowing-down before stopping. Parking lots, border crossings, exit ramps, neighborhoods with traffic zones, rest areas, toll booths and travel plazas were all mentioned as potential locations for the strips.
[Via Future of Technology]
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