The Problem
Category: Energy/Health
An electric vehicle owner in a rural area often fears that his car battery will die before he reaches an electric charging station. Even urban EV owners fear their batteries will deplete in a major traffic jam. Stationary charging stations are often expensive to implement and particularly inefficient in rural areas.
The Tech
Amazon has been granted a patent for a roving drone that can attach to cars and infuse energy. The article suggests that the car battery could be recharged by the drone either when the car is idle or when it’s in motion.
The roving drone may be manually requested by drivers with low car battery via Alexa, which is already being installed in some Ford models. Alternatively, the roving drone may be dispatched automatically if a driver is signed up with Amazon Prime or another subscription service.
Furthermore, this patent may open the door for other Amazon deliveries to mobile individuals.
Article Title: New Amazon Drones Will Charge Your Car While You Drive
Website: Green Tech Media
Link: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/amazon-ev-drone-charging-while-you-drive
The Stakeholders Using The Tech
EV owners who subscribe to the service.
All automotive, train, airplane drivers and passengers who share the land/airspace with drones.
Amazon drone dispatchers/analysts.
Government/airspace regulators.
Street/highway patrols in case of accidents.
Highway maintenance crews in case of drone failures.
The First Three Steps
- Amazon needs to create a prototype that is light weight (current estimates say these drones will be 1,000lbs) and energy efficient themselves.
- Amazon needs to test its proof of concept to confirm that the roving drone can latch onto a moving vehicle under various weather/geographical conditions.
- Amazon needs to drum up support to pass legislation that allows Amazon to conduct a small live test.
UNI: gm2778
Comment on The Car as an Ambient Sensing Platform
“Perhaps these car sensors will determine if you’re driving near a notoriously bad driver so that you can be on high alert as you’re passing them or they’re passing you. Perhaps sensors will determine that a nearby driver always brakes late, thus your car warns you to maintain X distance behind. Perhaps sensors will lead to every driver having a visible driving rating that you can see in your windshield. Seems like the possibilities are endless.”
makeasmartcity 
This will be helpful for so many EV drivers. In the distant future this technology could maybe also be expanded to other areas, like electric ships or even just to charge the phone of a poor soul lost in the woods. It could potentially save lived, both in traffic and also in other places.
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Only took 4 blog posts to get my first reply – woohoo! Yea, drones have a lot of use cases, however they’re apparently super heavy as they transport anything significant (like a battery). So there needs to be some leap in battery storage tech, or make more energy-efficient drones.
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