“Vehicle technologies are advancing at an ever increasing pace and were committed to supporting the growth of ultra-low emissions vehicles on Englands motorways and major A roads”, Mike Wilson, Highways England’s chief highways engineer, said.
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But this new scheme is a lot more ambitious and potentially game-changing. The scheme will be dubbed “Electric Highways”.
England has given the go ahead for a wireless highway experiment in the UK. The Government has already done a feasibility study for the project.
Electric cars are becoming more popular, and charging points are becoming less and less of a rarity – however, the limited range of a single battery charge available with current technology means that longer journeys often involve stopping for a lengthy recharge.
“What has been committed to is that by 2016 or 2017 we will hold off-road trials – in other words not on a public road”, Stuart Thompson, a spokesman for Highways England, told the BBC. Other experts have questioned if the program will be cost effective or not. In 2013, the South Korean town of Gumi switched on a 12km (7.5 miles) route that allows buses with compatible equipment to be charged as they drive over it. “The potential to recharge low emission vehicles on the move offers exciting possibilities”.
Transport minister Andrew Jones says that “the government is already committing £500 million over the next five years to keep Britain at the forefront of this technology”.
The charging of the cars occurs through a phenomenon called Shaped Magnetic Field in Resonance.
Cables buried underneath the highway would generate electromagnetic fields that could be picked up by a receiver in the auto and transformed into electric power.
There is no clarity though on how much of a charge the material used for making the roads is going to provide, but it would definitely increase the amount of time cars could last between full charges at home or a designated charging station. It may be a few years later for the technology to be expanded on a wider scale.
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Trails are expected to last 18 months and if successful could lead to on-road trials.
