How much energy could be generated by wind along created by traffic flow along america`s highways?

Question

Placement of wind generators along busy highways at a lower level or even in the road bed could posibly generate a substantial amount of useable energy. Your thoughts ?

Answer 1

not a bad idea - in the center divide you could put up solar panels above with turbines below - the solar panels would trap the air and force it through the turbine while assisting on the production of additional electrical energy, which would all need to be hooked up to the grid anyway.  Now that's a 2 for 1

Nice!!!

Answer 2

Careful there.

It might be possible to capture waste energy without

increasing drag, but you'd get very little return on your

investment in doing so.

Answer 3

Not feasible. The 'wind' produced by a car is not of signifiant quantity even in traffic to drive even a modest wind turbine.

Even if it were possible the wind is nothing but turbulent displaced air and would be unusable for that reason alone.

Just stand 10 or 15 feet from any road way and you'll see what I mean.

Answer 4

Although alot of wind is generated by fast moving vehicles, it is only in strong enough concentrations in very limited conditions. The wind mills would have to be placed too close too to the vehicles, and that could create a safety hazzard.

If they were placed at a safe distance, further away from cars, then they probably wouldn't receive enough wind because it doesn't stay in one spot. Unlike the wind that the weather makes, this is as I mentioned earlier very concentrated.

However this might not be such a bad idea to place it at the entrance and exits of tunnels, where there is a drastic change in air temperature and pressure, plus the wind stays in one spot rather than spreading throughout the open air of a free-way. What I don't understand is why they don't put them ontop of bridges, they recieve tremeandous amounts of wind.

Answer 5

I like your thinking here because it sounds quite interesting, but i dont think this is a very feasible idea. The area of covered by the turbines would be quite small, limiting the amount of power that could be turned into electricity. Also, the turbines would have to be placed out of the way of the cars on the highway where the windspeed would be far less than the windspeed on the road.