A city in South Korea just turned on its first network of roads that power electric vehicles as they drive. As ExtremeTech's Sebastian Anthony reports, the city of Gumi, South Korea has "electrified" 15 miles of road. The power is transmitted wirelessly via Shaped Magnetic Field in Resonance (SMFIR), a technology developed by the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) that essentially runs 100 kilowatts of power through some cables at a very specific frequency (20 kHz in this case), creating a 20 kHz electromagnetic field.
– The future is now—in the South Korean city of Gumi, anyway, which just enabled 15 miles of road to recharge electric cars as they drive along, Business Insider reports. Cables about a foot underground generate a 20-kHz electromagnetic field, which is absorbed by a coil in the bottom of the vehicle, ExtremeTech explains. The system now works with two public buses, but 10 more are planned by 2015. Each has a battery one-third the size of a standard electric vehicle's, which makes the system even more efficient, as the buses weigh less and consume less energy.