As industry intensifies and, as analyses show, average household energy consumption has nearly doubled over the last decade, increased efforts have been initiated to search for sources of energy other than conventional ones, the resources of which are constantly dwindling worldwide. An alternative to natural gas, crude oil, hard coal and lignite, oil shale, and radioactive elements is so-called renewable energy, obtained from sunlight, wind power, sea waves, tides, and geothermal sources. Unconventional energy sources also include devices that make it possible to recover kinetic energy, accumulate it, and convert it into electricity. One such ingenious device is, for example, kinetic sidewalk tiles. Thanks to this invention, it has become common to say that electricity lies on the street – because that is indeed the case…
In the previous issue of “Logistyka”, in the article “Modern warehouse: sustainable means green”, I wrote, among other things, about the G. Blue Planet Chatterley Valley logistics center established in 2008 in Chatterley Valley, Staffordshire (UK), which implemented solutions enabling the acquisition of energy and heat 100% from renewable sources. At the time, kinetic tiles installed on the surface of access roads used by delivery trucks to reach the warehouse were considered an absolute hit among pro-ecological solutions applied in this facility. This time, a few words about other applications of kinetic tiles.
The British company Pavegen Systems Ltd. installed such devices on a sidewalk on one of London’s streets. Under the pressure of people walking on it, kinetic energy is accumulated using lithium-polymer batteries and then converted into electricity. It has been calculated that each such tile installed in a sidewalk, which pedestrians step on about 50,000 times, is capable of producing 2.1 W per hour. Therefore, if a row consisting of several such tiles were placed, for example, along a bus stop, the energy generated by them would be enough to light up that bus stop all night long.
One of the nightclubs in Amsterdam also uses its guests to produce electricity. Kinetic tiles placed on the dance floor surface convert the energy of dancers into electricity used to power musical equipment, and furthermore, they give the floor a very interesting lighting effect. It is also worth emphasizing that materials recycled from tires are used to manufacture these devices. I believe that soon, eco-sidewalks will appear more and more frequently in places with heavy pedestrian traffic known to us around the world.
The article comes from the magazine “Logistyka” 5/2010.