In a small town square in the Idaho panhandle, 30 hexagonal glass panels began quietly generating electricity under the feet of curious visitors. The installation marked the first public test of solar road tiles — a long-promised technology finally stepping out of the lab and into a real streetscape.
The project, developed by Solar Roadways, powers the fountain and restrooms in Sandpoint’s Jeff Jones Town Square. The panels also light up in programmable patterns and contain heating elements to melt snow and ice.
A live webcam lets anyone watch the tiles in action.
What the evidence shows
- Solar road tiles: Thirty hexagonal panels were embedded in Sandpoint’s town square, producing electricity for nearby public amenities.
- Heating elements: Built-in warming technology is designed to keep the surface clear through Idaho’s cold winters.
- Public transparency: A live webcam points at the installation so anyone can monitor performance in real time.
From crowdfunded dream to sidewalk reality
Solar Roadways spent years refining its concept, backed by a viral Indiegogo campaign in 2014 C.E. that raised more than $2 million from over 50,000 backers. The company also received funding from the U.S. Federal Highway Administration to test whether photovoltaic cells could survive under traffic.
Sandpoint, home to founders Scott and Julie Brusaw, offered the ideal proving ground. The town square installation is modest by design — a public showcase rather than a highway-scale rollout.
Delays dogged the project for months before the tiles finally went live in 2016 C.E.
How the tiles work
Each hexagonal panel is made of tempered glass strong enough to bear pedestrian weight, with solar cells and LEDs sandwiched inside. The LEDs can display messages, warnings, or decorative patterns. Embedded heating strips help the surface shed snow — a feature that matters as much for safety as for energy output.
The panels connect to a shared electrical system that routes power to the fountain pump and the nearby restrooms.
Lasting impact
The Sandpoint test matters less for the kilowatts it produces than for what it represents. It showed that solar surfaces could survive foot traffic, weather, and the unpredictable demands of a real public space. That lesson has rippled outward.
Since 2016 C.E., engineers in France, the Netherlands, and China have built their own solar pavement projects — some as bike paths, others as short highway stretches. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory continues to study integrated photovoltaics as part of a broader push to embed clean energy into everyday infrastructure.
The bigger idea — that roads, sidewalks, and parking lots could double as power plants — remains alive because small tests like this proved it was worth trying.
Blindspots and limits
Solar roadways have struggled with efficiency and durability. Panels laid flat generate less electricity than angled rooftop arrays, and several later pilot projects reported cracked tiles and underwhelming output. The French Wattway highway test, for instance, was widely judged a commercial disappointment.
Sandpoint’s tiles were also plagued by technical glitches in their early months, with several panels going offline soon after launch. The technology’s future may lie less in highways than in pedestrian plazas, courtyards, and low-traffic surfaces where the tradeoffs make sense.
Why it still inspires
Even an imperfect experiment expands the space of what people believe possible. A decade earlier, the idea of walking across a glowing, snow-melting, electricity-generating sidewalk belonged to science fiction.
Sandpoint made it ordinary — at least for 30 panels, on one square, in one small town.
Read more
For more on this story, see: Engadget
For more from Good News for Humankind, see:
- Renewables now make up at least 49% of global power capacity
- Ghana establishes its first marine protected area at Cape Three Points
- The Good News for Humankind archive on renewable energy
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