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am_Unition  ·  2595 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Water is wet, fire is hot and the Solar Roadway is a complete disaster

Credit where credit is due. Noice.

Consider also the engineering challenges of developing a product meant to function very remotely but still very much in the public realm. Make sure people can't steal your trade secrets, make sure there aren't any security vulnerabilities. Maybe a quick analysis shows it's most cost-effective to include a massive surveillance system for the first decade of solar roadway attempts. Certainly for now, while there are still "cords".

The need to consolidate our different infrastructures like this depends on the demands of civilization and the competing technologies. If we can get fusion going, there's going to be much less of a need to make the world a solar panel. I think it's probably 35 years or so before we have a distributable product. I wonder if we'll end up covering enough of the Earth's surface with panels to make a measurable offset in the current warming trends in the meantime. Doubtful.