Solar cars are scam. They are designed to get funding out of investors with poor understanding of technology.<p>Do some basic math. The electric energy harvested with the solar panels is negligible for transportation.<p>And why should we want to move around solar power plants? It makes much more sense to have them stationary. And to connect them to the power grid to sell the energy to others when the sun shines but the batteries are full.
What a biased article:<p>"that comes out to 10 to 20 miles per day, which is near negligible if you’re trying to use the car for anything other than city errands."<p>10-20 miles per day is a big chunk of a commute for a lot of people. This is hardly negligible.
This is a mostly dumb and gimmicky idea. It will fail. If we want serious climate solutions we need either a massive build-out of nuclear power or wind plus utility-scale battery (or potentially ammonia) storage. Solar energy has a ridiculously low EROI. Solar energy on a car? Probably an even lower EROI.
This has always seemed like the most stupid-obvious idea to me. It's amazing to see some recent examples getting closer to production! There are also mod kits available for some EVs which allow you to attach solar body panels that charge the propulsion batteries. And we have some examples of fully solar-powered EVs that have empowered nomads to travel the world without refueling or charging from electric grids. The fact that this is not already normal is insane.
there’s a market for this, even if it’s not you. the bulk of my daily travel happens by bike. i keep a car around for visiting friends/family in the nearby suburbs on the weekends. a typical week would have me driving it between 20-40mi. at that point, i can have an EV without having to upgrade any wiring in my home, or having to fight the roommates over our one off-street parking space where i could even plug an EV in.<p>the reason i wouldn’t buy this (yet)? i’m too cheap. since i spend so little time in a car already i can’t imagine ever paying more than $10k for one. by the time this model hits the used market i assume the solar efficiency and battery capacity will be about half what it is new, which might be too limiting for me. maybe future revisions will improve enough to counter that... or maybe the initial market is too small that they won’t be able to overcome that initial hurdle and build out.<p>but the product idea has some merit: i still wouldn’t write it off <i>entirely</i> the way a lot of people here are.
As someone that had to charge their EV by running an extension lead out of their first floor flat window, this is a compelling offer.<p>In the UK there's a large number of people that do not have dedicated parking (24.6%, or 6,642,000, of UK households [1]) making it more difficult to charge at home and benefit from reduced electricity prices through smart charging. If the cost of an EV with solar panels is comparable to other EVs this would help alleviate some of the issues faced by this set of drivers.<p>1: <a href="https://www.field-dynamics.co.uk/25-drivers-no-off-street-parking/" rel="nofollow">https://www.field-dynamics.co.uk/25-drivers-no-off-street-pa...</a>
a average fullsize car has approximately a 7 square meter roof. assume we get 100% of that.<p>times solar gets maybe 200 watts per square meter = 1.4kw.<p>times 6 hours of full solar (if you are lucky) = 8.4kwh.<p>divided tesla model 3 gets 2.4 kwh per mile (per below) ~ 4 miles range?
It's a nice idea, but the black color is going to be a serious problem for car that you park in the sun. I suppose they could have cooling fans running in it while it's sitting, otherwise the interior and battery are going to bake. Any plastic parts that aren't high-temp will go brittle.