Hi, yes, it's Solar Roadways time again. sorry I've got to do it I Know I've already done half a dozen videos busting Solar Roadways and showing what a gobsmacking Li facepalm were the stupid idea it is to put solar panels on a road that you actually drive on and not only have I done whiteboard videos going through the engineering calculations to prove demonstrable approve that it's just not in any way really practical. but I've also taken a real test results from Solar Roadways installations and analyzed those before. So I'll link those in down below and at the end of the video if you want to check it out.

Now the one we're going to take a look at today because many people have asked for this and it's only fair that we actually take a look at the test results from the world's biggest solar roadway installation. So let's take a look at it. It's the Coal S Whatwe project, which to be fair, is by far the best and most professional by an order of magnitude solution to implement solar roadways. It's actually probably as good as you can get from an engineering point of view.

The Ridiculous: Bruce Shores Solar Freakin Roadways is just an absolute joke. The one in the Netherlands was at the Solar Pathway. That's just users like concrete big installation. it's not very cost-effective This one.

Coal Less are a huge road building infrastructure company so they know what they're doing. They're little very thin polymer covered solar cells that you can basically just stick on to the existing road surface as they claim and it's not a bad solution. So they actually installed one more than a year ago now. so I thought we'd actually take a look at the test results as it happens over I've got test results for the last 11 months.

Rather than just calculations, we can analyze the real test results, compare it with a new nearby solar installation and see how good it is I won't need more than the one white board here to do it. Let's go now. In my previous white board analysis of the coal s whatwe project I came to the conclusion. effectively an absolute best knowledge.

Very generous, half the output for three times the cost, and we'll get to the conclusion, looking at almost a year's worth of data, and see if I was on the money or not. So late last year in 2016, there's a huge dog and pony show. The French minister for Silly Walks was there at the installation of this thing and telling the world how wonderful it is and how France is going to be a leader in solar technology. blah blah freakin' blah.

Anyway, it's a pretty big installation. It's like one kilo meter long. It's a 336 kilowatts which is huge. It uses what is it? 2,800 panels which are basically 120 watts each.

Assuming that it's a nominal solar irradiance of a thousand watts per square meter. Regular test conditions, it's five million dollars. Installation cost Co less. What 'we have said that it costs about six Euros per watt.

Module manufacturing cost divided five million Euros by 336 kilowatts installation size. It's fourteen point eight Eight Euros per watt. Is that reasonable? Well, let's go over here to a commercial solar farm. Wow Right off the bat, we're screwed.

Commercial solar farms are about a dollar. Fifty seven Euro per watt. Installed Houston We have a problem. so just of academic interest, The module cost is actually forty percent of the cost of the installation here, which is actually quite large compared to a commercial installation, which is typically it might be in the order of say, our fifteen percent of the installed system cost.

So road installation, the other infrastructure, and everything else inverters were in the whole kit and kaboodle. you know, duct, cable, duct ins, and all the rest of it. 888 euros. So that works out at about sixty percent of the cost.

So they do have some scope here as I mentioned in my previous video to actually lower the cost. The installation costs might come down if they ever get it to actually stick on an existing surface. but I Don't think we'll because you've got to have the cabling running under there. You've got to basically dig up at least a hole, bitumen, tarmac, layer of the road at least so that you can sink them down in and then have the cable ducts and whatnot actually coming out of the things.

So it's not a simple matter as they claim of just sticking them down. That makes for great marketing here, marketing. And anyway, as I mentioned in the previous video coalesce have said that there but sort of best-case pie-in-the-sky figure is going to be three euros per what that's module cost. so there might be able to lower the cost by half, but it's never ever going to get close to a commercial solar farm which is like like basically half coalescence.

best-case estimate installed. and they're still talking about the module. just the module cost. At 3 euros per watt, it has absolutely no chance of catching up to commercial solar technology, and this is the thing that a lot of a solar roadways fanboys keep wanting to talk up a bit.

you know, as the technology gets better and better, the cost is going to go down and down and down. Yeah, well, so is the cost of commercial solar farms. They have been since day dot and basically if it's already twice the size up here, if they even if they follow a linear trajectory down, it's still going to be twice the costs in the future. Just for the module, let alone installed and everything.

it's going to be multiple times the cost of summer shil. For solar farms, it'll never ever get down to the same cost. not even close. But I know you're saying Dave Show us the data.

Can we actually see the test results from this thing? Yes we can. I'll link it in down below. there's actually a French website which actually has like thousands of these solar farm installations and people's houses and things like that. You can just upload your data.

It's like PV output dot org I've got my own home solar power system linking videos and I'll link in my one down below as well. From anyway, there's a French website that has the exact data for this coal less whatwe Road and basically it goes back to last December but the December figure was a bit funny. Some nigo no actually tracked the data from January through to November because as I film this, we haven't finished December yet. So we've got 11 months worth of data and we can see nearby solar installations as well now.

I Couldn't really find one that matches the size of this, but it doesn't matter. We're going to adjust for that as you'll see. So I Found this one called our solar Array or whatever it is and this is a 27 kilowatt system so it's a reasonable size and here's a photo of it on top of what is it a house or a farm or whatever. and it's 30 kilometres away from the coal s what way one.

So good enough over the span of the year to have very similar weather. Only 30 kilometres apart and it's got 120 panels are linking the datasheet down below for those playing along at home. and it was actually built in 2010 and it doesn't actually use particularly good solar panels. they're quite old and there are only 135 watts per square meter normal output if you compare that up here to the coal s what we want which is the best modern technology there they can get I'm sure which is only 114 watts per square meter you can already see just compared to your average you know, home-based our solar panels they're not very good and old ones at that if you want to go after it.

not even commercial ones, but home ones now are approaching like some power ones. I'll have to link in those down below 200 watts per square meter. so already like the coal s what way one is way behind. It's not because of the cells that using it's because of the extra toughening, resins and other and the rough surface and everything else they have to put on top to make it usable as a roadway, so you're just going to get loss in that there's no way about it.

You know it's not like you can use low I and glass with excellent transmissive properties and everything else that you can in a regular solar panels that aren't driven on my bloody cars. So yeah, you're going to have to take a hit there already. So what I've done has actually got a spreadsheet of the test results from January through to November or the out production output results for these two systems. Even though they are greatly by an order of magnitude different in size here, it doesn't matter accounting for that in the spreadsheet.

so it's basically the production output divided by the nominal system size. Oh, so that's a nominal output per unit size so to speak. And here's the graph for it: comparing the two Now, it might look a bit funny. Let me try and explain two, but you don't have to understand.

The red curve is the one we really want to look at in the end, but the blue and the green one here. The green one on top is the solar one, the home-based one, and the blue one below it is the coal s Whatwe one, and you can see that it's basically a much lower output per unit size, so it can go anywhere from like, you know, just like half of the output of the home installation 1/2 I don't know, like 1/4 or 1/5 or something like that. And remember that they're only 30 kilometres apart. so over the span of that 11 months, the weather should be roughly similar between the two, the solar irradiation between the two should be very similar, and everything else.

so it's a pretty good adjusted for system size Apple to Apples comparison, and the coal s walkway one is pretty terrible. But the interesting part of this graph is actually the one on the right-hand y axes, which is actually the efficiency compared between the two. And you can see it ranges anywhere from about 150 percent to over 500 percent more efficient depending upon the month. That's like five times.

Like, what do you say to that? And you've got to remember, this is compared to just a pretty average residential rooftop installation, just at some fixed angle. You know it's probably not optimum angle. it's just some thing, let alone a a proper tract. A commercial installation that would use better quality and more efficient panels.

It, it's just. it's got to be much worse. This is just a real basic comparison. It's still not even close.

So what's causing that? Well, of course, the flatness of the thing in the worst possible month, right at the end of the year. When it's you know, basically the outputs dropping to bugger-all that could be maybe some extra grime on there. I'd No, you know that's gonna have some factor in. but I think it's just because it's really flat at that horrible angle.

Some of its like shaded. It's not that terrific. I See some trees there in the photos and stuff like that. But this is a realistic installation of a solar roadways so you know you can't argue.

That's not a fair comparison. In fact, if you actually take out the figures for the 11 months on average, it's two hundred and eighty eight percent more efficient for a not very highly SPECT home based solar installation. So what? what? what? what? Call this what way? So that's a pretty big fail right there. That's just on average.

These are the real measured test results over eleven months. So there you go. It's actually not that surprising as I've done in previous videos. You can do these calculations yourself.

It's not rocket science back in the envelope calculations and just common sense tells you when you put the solar panels flat instead of tilted and then you have to have the rough surface on there so you've got the transmissive loss we saw here. or 114 to 200 watts for a you know, a modern panel like that. You know it's almost half the efficiency of modern panel just due to those losses. And then you drive cars on them so not only shade at some of the time, although this roads in the middle of nowhere, that's like 2,000 cars a day, which isn't It's not really a lot of traffic, so not a huge demand.

But the tires, the rubber, all the dirt and grime and crap and rocks and sand and all sorts of crap that gets on that surface in embeds itself in is just going to let less and less light in. So to be interesting to actually see the results of this over several years. but 11 months it looks. you know, reasonable.

You can see the graph there, they kind of sort of track generally, so it's not like it's it's you know, like a couple of weeks after the car started drive and I just drastically dropped or anything. but you know it's it's doing all right. But you're still getting that huge amount of loss 288 percent. So it's like a third the efficiency of just a pretty average home installation, let alone a commercial one.

No contest. And on top of that, if you actually the National Renewable Energy Lab they've got really cool reports and everything. This is a US government thing, which I've used in our previous videos. If you actually run the numbers on a real installation at this location, in truth, that's how you pronounce it in France 3 336 kilowatts system.

When you actually lay them flat, its 288 kilowatt hours per year. That's you know, a real sort of estimated data based on the solar irradiation at that particular location. Over the whole year, they've got data on this sort of stuff. But if you have a commercial solar farm, you get 345 kilowatt hours per year compared to 285.

So it's basically 22% more efficient based on all everything else being the same system losses everything else because you've got the solar panels which track this. you know, track the Sun at least a one axis tracking like that. That's what I've got here. and then it gets even worse.

As we said, when you're factoring 140 and what's per square meter compared to, you know, a real modern commercial module. At 200 watts per square meter, it's 75 percent more per square meter. So you know, like we're talking, probably double the output here just because it's tracking. and because it's you know it hasn't.

It's not being used as a bloody road surface and has all those transmissive losses in it coming double. Why would you do this for an already marginal payback technology? So there's actually a fair bit of debate out there about the payback of solar systems, Be they commercial solar farms or home Are solar installations like that? It can. If you get down to the nitty gritty detail, they can get quite difficult to actually work out exact numbers based on it cost, an environmental payback, and manufacturing, cost of lifespan, and all the rest of it. It's really, you know, quite difficult, but and already marginal technology, and you want to try and save the planet by getting half the output right off the bat, let alone all the long-term problems with maintenance and everything else.

Which I'm not even going to factor into this because the commercial solar farm? What's there to go wrong? Not much, right? But when you got a road, it's like so in the previous video, I Came to the conclusion that at best it was half the output for three times the cost. What is it here? Roughly one-third the capacity. I Mean it's going to be even worse than that as I said compared to a commercial solar farm. So I'm being very generous here for nine times the installation cost.

and as I said, the installation costs might come down I think in the previous video might said it might come down to six times the cost or something like that. but it why a third the capacity for nine times the cost. Based on real measured data, there is no way to spin this thing that this is a good idea. You just can't argue with demonstrable e true measured data.

It's just ridiculous. And as I said, the fanboys are, yeah, the cost will go down. It'll never ever be anywhere close to a commercial soul. Stirrers won't even come close to a cheap-ass Onehunga Brand a consumer rooftop solar system.

Not even not a hope in hell of doing it, let alone all the problems and all the infrastructure of putting this under a road. As I said here, cabling installation, your losses aren't there going to be more. And then you got the drainage and all sorts of things. You got wear and tear of the road surfaces.

How do you repair these things they easily like? Just why would anyone think this is a good idea I Don't know. So look Oh Granted, call us what way. Actually did a good job engineering wise, actually developing the right solution for a solar. Road if that's what you actually want compared to the two other main solutions out there, within one of which is that's Solar freakin' Roadways, there's just a an absolute joke.

It's just hobby level stuff, really done the best they can engineering wise. and I actually think it's quite good, but it's just not practical. There is just no way you could implement this on a mask a little bit, as in the previous video, an ecological disaster if you did so, it's a very, very poor choice. And any politician who recommends a solar road based on this sort of data at third, the capacity for nine times the cost, not even factoring in maintenance and everything else should be sacked.

Really, it is just a joke. So that's it. France is done there. - Solar Roadways.

It's done. It's - it. Like three different ones in progressive orders of stupidness, up to one that is the best engineering stupid solution possible. and it's still utterly utterly busted.

But hey, I'll be fair, there might be some niche you know use for this thing in some locations. Something like that, but just as an idea to save the planet to pave all the roads. What do they want? A thousand kilometres of this crap in France They're already the laughingstock they put a thousand kilometres in Oh Aren't balloon. This is the world's best solar roadway installation.

The biggest, It's a kilometer long and it's not even in the ballpark of being practical. I'm done. Solar roadways busted. So can we please not have to do this again? I'm just done.

What's this? My seventh video on solar roadways and some people just still want to believe in it. Don't It doesn't work. It's not practical. Get over it.

catch you next time you.