You’re really caught up on energy efficiency, civil engineering is not just thermodynamics. Energy is becoming incredibly cheap, before the current administration derailed our energy sector, we were on track to hit $0.03/kWh for utility scale renewable power by 2030. For reference, that’s about $10 to clear that city block.
And again, systems like this and the more famous one in Holland MI are generally run on waste heat (from a power plant, wastewater treatment plant or datacenter), so that math doesn’t even apply. Looking only at energy cost leaves you tripping over dollars to save pennies.
The real costs are and always have been infrastructure. Yes, it’s not possible to use this as a drop-in everywhere. It highly depends on the usage/wear of the road, space constraints, upfront cost of installation, maintenance, access to a heating solution, etc, etc… Even with this hydronic layout the main costs are the transmission lines, the cost to heat them is minor.
It’s very weird to see so much resistance to this in an anti-car community, as if pedestrian and micromobility infrastructure doesn’t need snow removal too.
Not an excuse for wastefulness. The numbers here are so great that a good sized city would need a nuclear reactor brought online just for this.
systems like this and the more famous one in Holland MI are generally run on waste heat
That’s fine if it’s available. It’s usually heavy industry that’s providing that. If you don’t have a convenient heavy industry to provide that, then move on.
It’s very weird to see so much resistance to this in an anti-car community, as if pedestrian and micromobility infrastructure doesn’t need snow removal too.
What of it? There’s perfectly good plows for walking and biking paths, too.
You’re really caught up on energy efficiency, civil engineering is not just thermodynamics. Energy is becoming incredibly cheap, before the current administration derailed our energy sector, we were on track to hit $0.03/kWh for utility scale renewable power by 2030. For reference, that’s about $10 to clear that city block.
And again, systems like this and the more famous one in Holland MI are generally run on waste heat (from a power plant, wastewater treatment plant or datacenter), so that math doesn’t even apply. Looking only at energy cost leaves you tripping over dollars to save pennies.
The real costs are and always have been infrastructure. Yes, it’s not possible to use this as a drop-in everywhere. It highly depends on the usage/wear of the road, space constraints, upfront cost of installation, maintenance, access to a heating solution, etc, etc… Even with this hydronic layout the main costs are the transmission lines, the cost to heat them is minor.
It’s very weird to see so much resistance to this in an anti-car community, as if pedestrian and micromobility infrastructure doesn’t need snow removal too.
Not an excuse for wastefulness. The numbers here are so great that a good sized city would need a nuclear reactor brought online just for this.
That’s fine if it’s available. It’s usually heavy industry that’s providing that. If you don’t have a convenient heavy industry to provide that, then move on.
What of it? There’s perfectly good plows for walking and biking paths, too.