Did the sidewalk you walk on every morning secretly generate clean electricity?

This article explores a series of underrated, widely deployed new energy applications that blend seamlessly into ordinary daily life, without the bulky facilities people usually associate with renewable power.

Most people rush past sidewalks, crosswalks and station platforms every day without paying the slightest attention to the ground beneath their shoes, never guessing that the simple act of walking can generate usable electricity. The technology behind this magic is far from an unproven sci-fi concept, it is mature piezoelectric kinetic harvesting material that has been mass produced and put into commercial use for more than a decade. When people step on the specially modified ground tile, the tiny built-in flexible sensor will capture the pressure generated by the footstep, and convert the tiny kinetic energy into electrical energy through the internal semiconductor structure. There is no noise, no emission, and no need for any extra maintenance after the tiles are paved. A 12-square-meter test section laid at a busy downtown transit hub in London can collect enough electricity from 2,700 daily passing pedestrians to power 18 nearby street lamps for 12 full hours every night. Many cities in eastern China have also laid similar energy harvesting tiles on the exit platforms of high speed railway stations, the electricity collected from the tens of thousands of daily passengers can run the low-temperature heating wires under the tiles in winter to prevent ice and snow accumulation, eliminating the need for extra grid power input for the de-icing system.

Another underrated new energy facility that people encounter almost every week is the modified speed bump installed at the entrances of residential communities and commercial parking lots. Unlike ordinary rubber speed bumps that only serve to slow down vehicles, these special kinetic harvesting speed bumps can capture the pressure generated by passing cars when they roll over, and convert the downward kinetic energy into rotation force that drives the built-in micro generator. Each speed bump can generate around 1.2 kilowatt hours of electricity per day if 300 to 500 vehicles pass over it, which is enough to support the continuous operation of all the security cameras, perimeter alarms and wireless signal transmitters at the community entrance. Many old residential areas that did not reserve extra power supply capacity when they were built have replaced their original ordinary speed bumps with this new energy model in recent years, avoiding the huge cost of digging up roads and laying new power cables, cutting the total transformation cost of community public facilities by nearly 70 percent. By the end of 2023, more than 320 old residential communities across the country have completed the installation of these kinetic energy harvesting speed bumps, bringing stable independent power supply to more than 120 thousand households’ public area facilities.

Most people’s impression of solar power is limited to the large dark blue rigid panels installed on rooftops or in large desert photovoltaic farms, but the new generation of transparent thin film solar materials have been widely used in public facilities that people come into contact with every day without being noticed. The semi-transparent flexible thin film can be cut into any shape, and can be directly fixed to the top surface of bus stop shelters, outdoor electric bike charging shed and even the sunshade awning outside coffee shops. It can block 70 percent of harsh direct sunlight to lower the temperature under the shelter by 5 to 7 degrees in summer, while absorbing sunlight to generate electricity. A standard 15-square-meter bus stop shelter equipped with this kind of thin film can generate around 2.3 kilowatt hours of electricity per sunny day, which is enough to run the electronic real time bus arrival display, the USB charging ports for waiting passengers, and the small night light at the stop for the whole night, without connecting to the municipal power grid at all. For many business districts that used to struggle with insufficient grid capacity to add new electric vehicle charging piles, these solar charging sheds can generate enough power to meet 80 percent of the charging demand for shared electric bikes in the area, no extra grid expansion project is required.

All these scattered, small distributed new energy facilities work together to form a hidden energy network that covers every corner of the city, which is far more efficient than many people imagine. There is no need to occupy extra farmland or desert land, no huge fan blades that affect the surrounding landscape, no complicated long distance power transmission lines, every kilowatt hour of electricity generated comes from the tiny energy that would otherwise be completely wasted in people’s daily activities, from footsteps to car rolling force to sunlight that hits the top of the bus shelter. According to the statistics from China’s new energy industry association, if all public areas in prefecture level cities across the country install these applicable small distributed new energy devices, the total annual generated electricity can reach more than 270 billion kilowatt hours, which is equivalent to the total annual power generation of 38 large coal fired power plants, cutting nearly 220 million tons of carbon dioxide emission every year.

The most appealing part of these new energy applications is that they never ask people to change their original living habits to reduce emission, there is no extra cost or trouble added to daily life at all. You do not need to make a detour, you do not need to operate any complicated equipment, even do not need to notice the existence of these facilities, your normal daily activities will contribute to the clean power generation process. In the near future, ordinary consumers can even buy small sized piezoelectric tiles to lay on their balcony, and small pieces of thin film solar stickers to paste on the edge of their window glass, the tiny electricity they collect together can power your small smart home devices like bluetooth speaker, door lock sensor and wireless charger, cutting tiny bits of unnecessary power consumption from every corner of your life. New energy is no longer a grand engineering project that only exists in far away industrial parks, it has quietly integrated into every tiny detail of your daily life that you have never noticed before.