Say, is there any place in the world where the shopping trolleys get the minimal regular maintenance that they need?
Everywhere I go, the trolleys all have wheels which have come loose and could be tightened with a wrench in seconds, but instead are left to rattle and wear into an early grave.
In the name of the FSM, is there any shop in the world not too dumb to maintain their own infrastructure? Anyone???

I'm not sure that electricity is all that green. A lot of electricity energy is lost as heat during transmission through the land line. Sure, an automobile engine may only get 30% conversion of fuel to motion, but fuel burning electrical plants have the same problem. Somewhat higher efficiency - but nowhere near 60%. And gasoline doesn't lose energy as it sloshes around in the tank. Electricity loses power every meter it moves.

It is amazing how much comment, and how quickly, some threads generate.
It is obvious that stores need to install "kinetic plates" in the aisles to capture the energy from all those shopping trolleys.

Great idea! The fatter the shoppers, the more electricity generated, and calories burned. Everybody wins!

Install them in basketball courts across the country!

I would have to disagree
 

"What this system does do is rob customers of (granted, minute amounts of) fuel energy, so the overall cost of this system considering everybody involved is greater than before."

um, that is more than a reach. it's using kinetic energy that would otherwise be lost completely when the vehicle braked and came to a stop. it was going to be dissipated/wasted regardless as 99.99% of the vehicles out there aren't going to have regenerative braking systems. if it was placed in the middle of a street where you wouldn't normally be decelerating, different story.

WOW! new cellar lurker record! 2 posts on almost 4 years... outstanding.

Good points too.

The poster has a serious economy of words.

Put one in front of the toilet and buy a keg of beer. C U LTR, power co.!

One thing noone noted was the fact that they are in the stores parking lot. They are taking energy from their own property after all. This seems a lot more resonable than the 10.00 parking fees we pay for concerts, football games, etc. Sounded like a good deal to me

Only if the plates performed a braking function, if they are just in the lane so you drive over them then they are taking the kinetic energy of your vehicle, which if you just speed up again caused you to burn more fuel to replace it.

If they are placed say at the entrances where there would be a speed bump ( sleeping policeman ;) ) to reduce speed as you enter the car park, then it could be an efficient and green redistribution of energy, damn I'm going to have to RTFA now :mad2:

Where this is truly green will depend on, thus, the amount of extra fuel that is necessary to move the cars over the bumps verises the amount of coal spent to produce the same amount of energy.

Regardless, this is capturing energy and innovative which should be applauded . It is this kind of thinking that will propels us to green power.

Finally from what I have seen in the diagrams I buy that they could produce 30kw/hr at peak efficacy

Um, yes, actually they do get better than 60%.

We have speed bumps all around my neighborhood. It would be awesome to put these things in instead. (Assuming the snowplows don't destroy them.) In fact, I'd like to put one in front of my house and plug it in to our electrical system (on our side of the meter.) Slow the damn cars down as they speed by, and power my house at the same time.

My car is green (mint green, actually) does that count?
 

:D