Speed Bumps Harvest Electricity from Moving Cars

I agree with one of the commenters: "It only makes sense if the speed bump is actually necessary, not solely for the purpose of powering something."

But in general I don't think speed bumps are necessary...

 

Agreed. I weave around them whenever possible...and will go to great lengths to avoid them. I don't run over objects that it is unnecessary to run over in the first place.

 

Isn't this like a broken windows fallacy for energy? I'm assuming it isn't "free" for a car to drive itself up over a speed bump - it certainly takes some amount of gas being burned. Assuming the speedbump converts all this extra gas energy to electricity (which is a super simplification) it's still a losing proposition to burn extra gas to overcome the internal friction of a transmission to turn wheels that create some amount of heat to exert a force on a speedbump which then creates electricty.

I mean, it's kind of a Rube Goldberg energy capture device - you've got to be a lot more efficient simply sucking fuel out of people's cars and putting it in a generator.

 

Don't give Burger King any ideas...

It's already got me thinking about some way of sneaking a speedbump out in front of my house... :heh:

 

A one-inch high speed bump that blends in with the street and only if someone looks for it, will they know it is there. It will power my house ...on foreign oil.
But in the future, it will power my house from EVs from other people's solar panels. High Tech Scientific Parasite...

Knowledge and Education is Power. Power can be used to do MANY different things. And, with Power comes Responsibility.

Maybe I will open a Fitness Club, charge people $80 a month, and all of the exercise equipment will generate electricity that I will use to power my house. Now, that is an environmentally-friendly, responsible way to earn a living