Roads that Light Themselves

Roads that Light Themselves

I've added a new tag to the list of keywords this blog uses (see to the right): Innovation. Instead of occasionally telling about an Israeli invention as a way of scoffing at the boycotters, I've decided to tell about them as part of what Israel is. A positive narrative, not a reacting negative one.

Here's today's offering: roads that generate electricity. Someone who knows more than I about physics and engineering told me recently that there may be a downside to this invention: vehicles traveling on such roads may find that their use of fuel is a bit higher; then again, he said, perhaps not. If the energy being harnessed by the roads is otherwise simply being lost, the new invention is pure gain. (Well, pure gain minus the cost of tampering with existing roads. You might want to buy stock in your nearby asphalt company, or in steamrollers. But not in steamrollers from Caterpillar - they're boycotted).

Update: an Israeli chemist has just won the Nobel Prize. Ada Yonath, from the Wiezman Institute. I can't tell you what it is she got the prize for, but apparently it's something to do with antibiotics, and is part of an arc of research which is already saving lives and will save more as it gets built upon. Time to divest from the Wiezman Institute, don't you think?

Originally posted by Yaacov Lozowick's Ruminations