If you don’t own a Tesla now, then don’t bother! Cooler and better products are on its way. Solar cars have been a dream for a while and it seems that we are now finally reaching it.
Is Tesla really that clean and eco-friendly? Think about it. Yes, you might argue, that the car doesn’t emit any CO2 or other greenhouse gases while driving. But think about the source of the electricity. Often times, the source of energy that is charging the batteries used are coming from conventional sources of energy such as coal and gas. So, in reality, all we are doing by driving electric cars, is we are deferring the pollutants from the city centers to the plant locations. What if the generation of energy and the use of that energy was at the same place. We wouldn’t need Petrol stations which are always busy and definitely wouldn’t need to wait hours at the charging stations to get moving again. Well, a team in Eindhoven is trying to make it a reality using solar power. Yes, using solar to drive cars. They are creating a car that charges itself,and it does it using the sun.
The reason why we you are not driving an electric car is because it is not practical yet. They are facing the problem of scalability. It is a simple chicken and egg problem where unless there will be enough electric cars, there won’t be enough stations and unless there are enough stations, there won’t be enough electric cars bought. The lack of well-distributed charging stations makes it difficult to rely on the infrastructure to plan longer trips. Since solar cars do not need the charging stations, they overcome the chicken and egg problem and will make the roll out much smother.
You might be wondering that we have heard about solar cars for years now and where are they? Are they still in concept and when will they roll out their first cars to the market? Well, in fact the team at Lightyear.one is planning the roll out for the first 10 cars in 2019 and then 100 more in 2020. And given that their source of energy and the point of consumption is at the same place, they don’t need the charging infrastructure to support it. You might be wondering if the car will even work in the gloomy weather of Rotterdam, they say Yes. Their tests estimate that in Amsterdam the car can drive 10,000 km per year on sunlight alone. Additionally, for the peace of mind, they have included an electric battery that shall supplement the solar power for the additional 800km if you need to cross Europe at night.
Buckle up for the next change in automotive.
