Highway England, the UK government's roads agency, has announced that motorists will be able to recharge their cars as they drive, if a scheme currently under consideration comes to fruition.
According to a BBC report the agency plans to test wireless power-transfer technology that could be built under the UK's motorway and road network and has completed a feasibility study. The agency is now asking companies to tender bids to host off-road trials.
The process, which has already been deployed in South Korea, uses a process called Shaped Magnetic Field In Resonance.
The power-transfer technology works by using electric cables buried under the road to generate electromagnetic fields. These are then picked up by a coil inside the device and converted into electricity.
A limited scheme, which involves buses being wirelessly recharged via plates installed into roads, was deployed in Milton Keynes last year, although with this system vehicles are obliged to stop to recharge.
Speaking to the BBC a spokesman for the agency said, "What has been committed to is that by 2016 or 2017 we will hold off-road trials - in other words not on a public road. Where exactly the trials will be has yet to be determined."
Full details will be publicised once a contractor has been appointed and experiments will be run for about 18 months before any decisions are made to run on-road trials.
Doubts have been raised about the cost of the proposed scheme according to the article, which highlights the improvements in battery technology which may, in themselves, make this scheme redundant.
Author
Neil Tyler
Source: www.newelectronics.co.uk