How useful is 1 minute of charge (assuming you are driving 60mph)?
For charging? Not at all
For doing a proof of concept of the technology and working out the manufacturing logistics? Probably quite a bit.
This isn’t for the benefit of the cars, it’s for the benefit of the builders of the road.
Building off @mllcb42, Gov. Whitmer is also trying to draw more people to the state by having us appear forward thinking and progressive
That worked really well for her during the pandemic.
All tech has to start somewhere, and this wouldn’t be the first implementation in the world - there has been testing going on in Europe, Israel, etc, too.
I’m not sure about the benefits for most consumer EVs yet, but I could see this being useful for buses, trucks, etc - i.e. vehicles that operate on closed loops or predictable routes and need to travel longer distances without stopping to plug in and charge.
My bigger question is how durable this is going to be in climates where the roads are already in horrible condition and always under repair…
Sounds like the BrownDoggle here in CA that we call High Speed Rail.
No one will benefit from a high speed rail from LA to Bakersfield, except the guys who built it.
I wonder if wireless power transmitters placed along major roadways is a better execution of this.
Didn’t rechargeable roads else where have major environmental issues?
I may be thinking of solar roads.
Nah, when I say benefit the folks who built it here, I mean in regards to gathering data/proving out the technology. They’re fronting at least some portion of the cost. From the sounds of this, the city is putting in ~$2M, which is probably covering the cost of the road itself, with the company covering all the costs for the charging hardware.
Yeah this would be great for city buses on closed loops