Climate Change Will Bring More Transportation Problems — Unitsky String Technologies Has A Solution
Weather wreaks havoc on transportation systems. Commercial aircraft can’t take off and land during stormy weather. Cars and trucks can’t drive on flooded roads. Ice, snow, and strong winds make traveling by car hazardous. Unfortunately, a warming planet means there will be more weather-related disruptions in the future.
Self-driving cars won’t be able to get us where we need to go if the roads are impassable. But the people at Unitsky String Technologies, Inc. have an answer — light and strong string-rail overpass that carries passengers and cargo high above the Earth. Prestressed elements are in the core of the string rails. The main tension load goes to the anchor supports. That’s why intermediate supports require less material and are lighter. Thus Unitsky String Technologies complexes cost far less to construct than any other type of overpass transportation system and are 10 times stronger than a conventional highway bridge or railway trestle. Even in the case that one of the supports is compromised by an earthquake, the supports on either side are strong enough to support the structure.
The Unitsky complex is nearly impervious to weather disruptions because ice and snow won’t stick to the rails. Flood waters flow around the supports, just as the water from a tsunami rushes in and spreads overland, then recedes, leaving the palm trees standing. As an added benefit, the system does not create a barrier for wildlife, which can travel underneath it without interruption. The system is unaffected by fog, smoke, or other visual impediments because instead of a human operator, artificial intelligence controls the speed of the uPods (a kind of autonomous electric car on steel wheels) and is unaffected by low visibility conditions.
Passengers are whisked along inside modern pods that feature advanced connectivity and entertainment choices. If the system is powered by electricity from renewable resources, such as solar or wind, the uPods have zero carbon emissions. There is also an option for a high-speed version of the technology that will transport passengers at speeds of over 300 miles per hour.
What are the use cases for the Unitsky String Technologies? California has been struggling for two decades to create a high-speed rail link between its major cities, but that proposal has gobbled up money at a ferocious rate and is nowhere near completion. Land acquisition costs have skyrocketed, setting the project back even more. The Unitsky complex will have much lower land acquisitions costs, as it needs only supporting structures. The vast majority of the system will pass over the land below rather than being constructed on the land itself.
Imagine what the Unitsky String Technologies complexes could mean for flood-prone areas like New Orleans and New York, both of which have been beset by flood waters from Hurricane Ida recently. Residents of those cities would not find themselves trapped by similar storms, as the Unitsky rails would continue to function normally despite the extreme weather. Cities impacted by rising sea levels could build transportation systems that are impervious to more frequent coastal flooding.
The high-speed Unitsky String Technologies solution is similar in many respects to the Hyperloop idea that proposes to bore tunnels underground to transport people and vehicles. That may be a good solution for crowded cities where land is at a premium, though the Unitsky complex can be installed above city streets without the visual and mobility barriers that elevated railways have created in the past. For long-distance travel, the Unitsky String Technologies systems should cost a fraction of the cost of making tunnels that are hundreds or even thousands of miles long. From an emissions point of view, those tunnels require massive amounts of concrete (the cement industry is one of the biggest contributors to the carbon emissions that are making the Earth too hot for human habitation).
Unitsky String Technologies will be at the Expo 2020 show in Dubai that begins on October 1, 2021. The company’s R&D uSky center is situated with a fully operational complex a few kilometers from the exhibition. It is open to visitors who will be able to view this potentially game-changing technology, learn more from the company representatives who will be on hand, and even take a test drive.
The Unitsky String Technologies solution is at its core a modern transportation device that offers reliable, high-speed, emissions-free mobility that is unaffected by many of the environmental factors that can bring conventional systems to a halt. It also promises to be significantly less costly than those conventional systems that have become very expensive to build. It is transportation reimagined for the 21st century.
This article is supported by Unitsky String Technologies.
Have a tip for CleanTechnica? Want to advertise? Want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here.
Latest CleanTechnica.TV Video
CleanTechnica uses affiliate links. See our policy here.
