Scott Brusaw
General Electric (GE) has already chosen a dozen new partners to accelerate and commercialize technologies to help build the next generation power grid, as part of Phase I of its ecomagination challenge. Idaho's Solar Roadways project received the highest number of community votes in that round, and looks to be doing well in the current phase. As the hopefuls in the "Powering Your Home" phase go before the judges, we take a quick look at some of the entries that have caught our attention. Read More
Although great strides have been made recently to make offices more energy efficient, fluorescent office lighting is still great cause for concern. Installing controllers which automatically switch off lighting when no movement is detected is one method of saving energy but Solaroad Technologies proposes recycling otherwise wasted light energy by placing cylindrical photovoltaic harvesting and storage devices on top of workstation cubicle walls. Read More
Idaho-based Solar Roadways founder Scott Brusaw is excited that his company has a received a USD$100,000 U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) grant to develop further his prototype that turns roads in giant electricity-generating solar panels. Apart from providing energy to power our homes, street lighting and so on, the roads could contain thousands of embedded LEDs to provide better street signage and make driving safer. He also believes the solar panel roads could last up to three times longer than the current petroleum-based asphalt surface and even be heated in winter to discourage dangerous ice build ups. Read More
