Under-road heating system to keep Europe’s highways ice-free

‘In the future, changes in the energy market will take into account environmental impact, and in addition to our system not relying on fossil fuels, it is also very efficient,’ Elimelech said.

‘Because of its electrical efficiency, it can be powered by renewables,’ he added.

Drivers can also be alerted to real-time road conditions thanks to new road monitoring systems.

The Sweden-based Klimator-RSI project aims to measure, model and map such conditions, alert road maintenance teams, or warn motorists.

Existing highway weather stations on fixed poles, which trace their roots back to the 1970s, can provide a general idea of what things are like on the road, but cannot give enough detail needed to model the road surface.

Alerts

The RSI system developed by Sweden’s Klimator AB automatically uploads and analyses ground-level data gathered from vehicles connected remotely to a computer network.

By measuring the rate of spin on each of a vehicle’s wheels – and the differences between these – it calculates the road friction to assess the surface conditions.

‘A particularly good thing about this model is that it can take data from a few cars, and by integrating this with details such as the weather, microclimate, the topographical area and other influencing factors, it can extrapolate to build a complete picture of the local conditions,’ said project coordinator Dr. Torbjörn Gustavsson, who is also chief executive of Klimator AB.

By crunching the data and overlaying it on a map display, the system can provide alerts to direct road maintenance teams with snow ploughs, or grit or salt, to specific roads ahead of peak traffic times. The developers are currently in regular contact with maintenance crews testing the system to assess its effectiveness and make suggestions for improvement.

Gustavsson said plans include using the data in real time in a mobile phone app, or a vehicle navigation system, whether used by a motorist, or a self-driving car.

‘We are in discussion with autonomous vehicle manufacturers, with a view to integrating the systems into their operation,’ he added.

While the technology is currently being tested in taxi fleets in Sweden, Norway and Lithuania, the plan is for it to be installed in regular vehicles during production in the future. Klimator hopes for the system to be available on the market as soon as next winter.

‘In the future, this information will be available to the drivers themselves, so they can see what the local risk is – exactly where they are,’ Gustavsson said.

This article is published courtesy of Horizon, the EU research and innovation magazine