They test solar panels on a Tesla car 0:38
Gosforth, Australia (Reuters) --
Australian scientists will test using printed solar panels to power a Tesla on a 15,100-kilometre journey starting in September that they hope will spark public thinking about measures to help stave off climate change.
The Charge Around Australia (CAA) project will install 18 printed plastic solar panels on a Tesla electric car, each 18 meters long, and deploy them alongside the vehicle to absorb sunlight when it needs a recharge.
Paul Dastoor, the inventor of printed solar panels, said the Newcastle University team would not only test the strength of the panels, but their potential performance for other applications.
"This is actually an ideal test bed to give us insight into how we could use and push the technology in other remote places, for example in space," Dastoor told Reuters in the town of Gosforth, north of Sydney.
Paul Dastoor, leader of the Charge Around Australia project and inventor of printed solar panels, in Gosforth.
Printed solar panels are made of a lightweight, laminated PET plastic that can be made for less than $10 per square metre.
The panels are manufactured on a commercial printer originally used to print wine labels.
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Dastoor said using the panels to power a vehicle would make Australians think more about electric vehicles and could help ease their "range anxiety".
"The community is looking for these kinds of answers to the problems that come their way, day in and day out, around climate change," he said.
On their 84-day journey in the Tesla, the team plans to visit some 70 schools to give students a taste of what the future may hold.
Asked what Elon Musk, creator of the Tesla and founder of Tesla Inc, would think about the CAA project, Dastoor said he hoped he would be satisfied.
CAA was "showing how our innovative technology is now being combined with their developments to generate new solutions for the planet," said Dastoor.
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