Physics are still physics. Mounting solar panels flat (rather than angled to the south), under a protective resin and reinforced glass (or whatever), under the partial shade of passing traffic, and under the dark dirt and oils of a roadway, was always going to generate much less electricity for a much higher cost and with much higher wear and tear, compared to mounting same panels on elevated beds above the road or next to it or over parking lots or basically anywhere else.
It makes zero economic sense and it always did.
The added features of melting snow and LED lighting and such are just diversions from this fact.
I am certain the founders realize this, and their current business model is to live off research grants and trial installations.
Do you believe that the founders always knew that the concept wasn't viable, or that after beginning as innocents they later discovered their product was BS and at that point crossed the line?
The flood of start-ups in the last decades that promise the sky while mining government grants and investor's gullibility indicates to me that there is something lacking in the education of these "geniuses", the cynics who get on board and the flock who beg to be fleeced.
I don't believe that Elizabeth Holmes started out intending to perpetrate the massive fraud that Theranos became. Her flaw going in wasn't veniality but ignorance of some very basic concepts of blood testing. The cynical Ramesh certainly understood what he was creating, the employees began by believing the image of Holmes, the vaunted Board consisted of political heavyweights who could unlock government funding - but who had zero knowledge of the impossibility of:
The science of blood testing
Holmes ignorance of the subject she professed to have mastered
Ramesh's veniality
or the ignorance of senior employees or other board members WRT the subject.
Holmes background as the daughter of an Enron VP with deap government connections lead almost everyone including Elizabeth to assume she was excessively gifted, as opposed to being excessively narcissistic and unable to take suggestions let alone direction from others.
She was schooled at an exclusive private facility in Houston, afforded a personal Mandarin tutor at home, then part way through high school attended Mandarin summer classes at Stanford.
What a setup for raising a towering ego that honestly believed she was somehow far ahead of her peers, her teachers, or anyone in a position to bring her back to reality. A summer internship in Singapore served to further separate her from the feedback that friends or peers might have offered.
When her medical professor and many other professionals as Stanford told her that she was simply wrong, she ignored them and went over their heads, cut her schooling short, and used her family's money (intended for her education) to finance her 1st start-up.
I'm picking on Holmes because much of the her history is now publicly accessible.
This pattern of isolation from peers, interrupted education, a wealthy (corrupt) parent, exposure to international travel (and isolation), impossibile expectations, and an intimidating family are repeated in all or in part in the histories of many suspect startup's CEOs.
Why these frauds seem to be on the rise might be due to recent loose money policies, a more gullible, untutored investor class, the now legal bribery of government officials in the US - or perhaps we're just experiencing a natural wave of unrepentant narcissists with inflated egos?
Terry