How to transform an asphalt concrete pavement into a solar turbine

Highlights: • We create a system for harvesting energy from asphalt concrete. • We create an artificial porosity in the asphalt concrete. • We connect a chimney to this porosity. • Differences in temperature produce an air flow. • This air flow serves also for cooling down the pavement. - Abstract: Asphalt concrete can absorb a considerable amount of the incident solar radiation. For this reason asphalt roads could be used as solar collectors. There have been different attempts to achieve this goal. All of them have been done by integrating pipes conducting liquid, through the structure of the asphalt concrete. The problem of this system is that all pipes need to be interconnected: if one is broken, the liquid will come out and damage the asphalt concrete. To overcome these limitations, in this article, an alternative concept is proposed:parallel air conduits, where air can circulate will be integrated in the pavement structure. The idea is to connect these artificial pore volumes in the pavement to an updraft or to a downdraft chimney. Differences of temperature between the pavement and the environment can be used to create an air flow, which would allow wind turbines to produce an amount of energy and that would cool the pavement down in summer or even warm it up in winter. To demonstrate that this is possible, an asphalt concrete prototype has been created and basics calculations on the parameters affecting the system have been done. It has been found that different temperatures, volumes of air inside the asphalt and the difference of temperature between the asphalt concrete and the environment are critical to maximize the air flow through the pavement. Moreover, it has been found that this system can be also used to reduce the heat island effect