When the Roman poet Catullus wrote about devouring the road, he meant it as a metaphor for journeying. The prospect of physically extracting energy from the roadway may just become a reality, though, if the U.K. government pulls off the test run of a promising new tool.
古羅馬詩人卡圖盧斯（Catullus）曾在詩中寫下“吞食道路”，作為旅行的隱喻。不過，如果英國政府對一項前景廣闊的新工具的試運行成功的話，從公路汲取能量的想法或將成為現實。

Off-road trials of “dynamic wireless power transfer” technology are expected to start later this year and run for 18 months, Highways England and Transport Minister Andrew Jones announced. The government will install the devices under test roads and in vehicles, and determine if the charging could work on Britain’s busiest roadways. Mobile charging would solve one of the biggest hurdles to electric vehicle use — staying charged on long drives.
英格蘭公路公司（Highways England）和英國交通部長安德魯?瓊斯（Andrew Jones）近日宣布，“動態無線電力輸送”技術的越野試驗預計在今年晚些時候開始，測試期為18個月。政府將在測試段公路路面下和測試車輛上安裝相應設備，以確定在英國最繁忙的路面上能否獲得預期的充電效果。移動充電將消除電動車輛普及的最大障礙之一，就是在長距離駕駛時保持電量充足的問題。

The U.K. has already tested a bunch of different approaches to this technology and identified versions that work and are ready to manufacture. In basic terms, the system has power lines connected to coils under the surface of a road, which then transmit the electricity through the air to a receiver coil in a car. Simply driving down the stretch of road in a properly-equipped electric or hybrid-electric vehicle will power up the batteries.
英國政府已經測試了應用該技術的不同辦法，確定了其中行得通的方案，準備投入生產。簡單地講，這個系統將輸電線和路面下的線圈相連接，通過空氣將電能傳輸給汽車里面的接收線圈。安裝了相應設備的電動車或混合動力車只需在這種路面上行駛便可為電池充電。

The power transfer could potentially work for all types of vehicles, the report notes, and since it goes under the road, it won’t require building any contraptions above ground that could increase risks of collision or electric shock. The wireless transfer is less cluttered and invasive than the overhead cables used for city trains, trolleys, and a prototype zero-emission highway in L.A.
報告中指出，這項電力輸送技術有可能適用于各種類型的交通工具，因為它是安裝在地下的，無需在地面建設設施，這也就減少了碰撞和電擊的風險。比起城鐵、有軌電車以及洛杉磯的零排放高速公路原型使用的接觸網，這種無線傳輸更加整潔與安全。

If this works for the highways of Britain, it just might change the game for long-distance EV travel. A full charge of BMW’s i3, for instance, lasts 81 miles; it’s 84 miles for the Nissan Leaf and 38 miles gas free for the Chevy Volt. Those ranges are enough to cover most daily commutes, but insufficient for long road trips. Stopping for hours to charge up on the side of a highway isn’t going to make you feel much better about saving the earth. Picking up a charge without stopping, though, is one of the cooler things you could ask for from automotive refueling practices.
如果這一技術在英國的公路上得以實施，或將改變電動汽車的長途旅行。比如，一輛充滿電的寶馬i3可以跑81英里，日產聆風（Nissan Leaf）可以跑84英里，雪佛蘭伏特（Chevy Volt）不用汽油能跑38英里。以上這些距離足以應付多數日常通勤，但長距離駕車旅行恐怕就不行了。為了充電停在公路邊上好幾小時，即便是節約了能源也并不會令你感到多好過。不過，說到給汽車充電這件事，無需停車即可充電是你能期待的最酷的事情之一。

Charging roads could pair well with another developing technology: street surfaces that generate their own power with solar panels. The Dutch SolaRoad bike path does that for a few hundred feet; in the U.S., Solar Roadways technology is planning for tests in sidewalks and parking lots in Idaho. Perhaps the smart roads of the future will not just make their own energy from the sun but transmit it wirelessly to a zippy fleet of EVs.
充電公路可以與另一項開發中的技術實現很好的配合，即通過太陽能面板產生能量的路面。荷蘭有一條幾百英尺長的太陽能自行車道使用了該技術。在美國，太陽能公路技術計劃在愛達荷州的人行道和停車場進行測試?；蛟S在未來智能公路不僅可以轉化太陽能，還可以將電力無線傳輸給一輛輛電動汽車。

Vocabulary

devour：吞噬

coil：線圈

EV：電動汽車（electric vehicle）

contraption：裝置

英文來源：CityLab

譯者：白潔

審校&編輯：劉明