Part of the premise is that, since the cost of solar panels is coming down and the cost of asphalt is skyrocketing, at some point it will be cheaper to lay down panels than asphalt.

I'm still not sure this is all a good idea, but it's certainly an interesting one.

>> ^Jinx:

Still seems like a silly idea to me.
Wouldn't it just be cheaper to run Solar Panels alongside the road instead of making them the road. I mean, whats the advantage in driving on the solar panels? Ok, you could argue it kills two birds with one stone, but consider the cost it requires to make solar panels you can drive on...it start to become quite an expensive stone.

I just found a TEDx event where he presented this (see here) and he makes an interesting point: these don't have to be roads. They can be parking lots, walkways or playgrounds. They're aiming for parking lots first so that, as he put it, they can learn from their mistakes at low speeds rather than throwing them into the fast lane and seeing what happens.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'TEDx, TEDxVancouver' to 'TEDx, TEDxVancouver, blomkamp, kurzweil, civilization, kardashev scale' - edited by gwiz665