[ajsnigrutin]

Solar sidewalks, solar roads, now solar rail?

WHY?! Dave from eevblog did the math and it's bad

Did we really fill up all the area on top of roofs, parkings lots, industrial areas, etc., and we're running out, and we have to put solar cells on railroads?

[Quitschquat]

I think these kinds of ideas capture easily impressionable, elected representatives whose technical knowledge is non existent.

[marysol5]

Dave always points at them as "bad" because they can be better in other places.

But ignore the bit of "why not both"

[ajsnigrutin]

I mean.. that's like putting solar cells in the shade... i mean sure, they work better in the sun, but why not both? They still produce a few milliwats of power in the shade too.

For the amount of money spent here, we could've build quite a few kilowatts of power capacity on more traditional surfaces, like if the project had to be rail related, on eg. roofs of rail platforms.

[prmoustache]

> Did we really fill up all the area on top of roofs, parkings lots, industrial areas, etc., and we're running out, and we have to put solar cells on railroads?

I guess it is easier to control the deployment since they own the railroads.

[marysol5]

"WHY DONT WE DO CARPARKS!"

"Because it's up to the owners?"

[leni536]

And all the train depots and train stations are already covered in solar panels, I presume.

[prmoustache]

They don't need to because it is just a PoC and I don't think it hs been said anywhere that soloar panel between rain tracks would be the unique source of energy.

There are also a lot of vertical sound proofing barriers that could be equipped with panels.