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Europe’s first solar panel roof-covered bike lane unveiled in Germany

Europe, Next Featured, Tech / /
Europe’s first solar panel roof-covered bike lane unveiled in Germany

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

At the beginning of the year, news readers were treated to images of German police forcefully removing climate activists from the village of Lützerath to make way for an open-air coal mine. Indeed, Germany may have averted a looming energy crisis this past winter by upping its coal consumption.

While prioritising energy independence may have caused a detour from the transition to renewables, the country’s goal is to reach climate neutrality by 2045: five years ahead of the EU target. A small step on the way but a step nonetheless is Europe’s first solar panel roof-covered cycling path which opened this week in the city of Freiburg, about a two-hour drive south of Stuttgart.  

The photovoltaic (PV) pilot project consists of a 300-metre-long installation featuring over 900 translucent glass solar panels, and will generate around 280 MWh of solar power per year. Solarwatt, the producer of the panels covering the path, says they are particularly durable as the solar cells are enclosed on the front and back by robust glass panes. 

Existing infrastructure has increasing role to play

The cleantech company now has three decades of experience creating solar panels and currently employs over 800 people across Europe. In 2022, it acquired Utrecht-based battery-storage specialist REConvert for an undisclosed amount, establishing a Dutch subsidiary. 

Solarwatt’s CEO Detlef Neuhaus believes rethinking photovoltaics will be essential for Germany’s transition to clean energy, and sees an untapped potential in already existing infrastructure. 

“Already sealed areas such as parking lots, paths and roads are playing an increasingly important role,” Neuhaus said. “We are proud that we could contribute our part to the success of this innovative pilot project.”

Woman riding bicycle under solar powered roof
Credit: Badenova AG & CO

The modules used in the bike lane project have general technical approval from the German Institute for Building Technology (DIBt). This means that they can be used without any restriction for both private and public projects, without the need for case-by-case testing. 

Solar-powered neighbour stadium

Meanwhile, the pilot bicycle lane is situated close to the SC Freiburg football stadium. The arena is already equipped with a 2.4MW solar panel roof, courtesy of around 6,000 heterojunction solar modules from Swiss manufacturer Meyer Burger.

This makes it the third-largest solar panel installation on any stadium in the world. (The largest belongs to Turkish Süper Lig football club Galatasaray’s home arena Nef Stadium, which comprises more than 10,000 panels.) 

The potential for much longer PV-roofed paths

This may be Europe’s first solar panel roof-covered bicycle path (excluding several projects where the path itself has been covered with PV panels). However, since 2014, South Korea boasts a 9 kmbicycle lane covered by a roof made of solar panels. 

This 4-metre wide lane runs in the middle of an eight-lane highway, and connects the cities of Daejeon and Sejong. Its 7,502 solar panels are capable of producing 2,200MWh per year – the equivalent of powering around 600 households, according to the country’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. Several other Korean cities have implemented the technology, but this remains the longest and most power-generating project to date.

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Transatlantic chip wars? UK needs to up its policy game, leading startup says

Next Featured, Tech, UK / /
Transatlantic chip wars? UK needs to up its policy game, leading startup says

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

While the UK is being labelled as “closed for business” and Rishi Sunak is playing Unicorn Kingdom in Silicon Valley, the British chip industry risks losing some of its strongest players due to a lack of supportive policies. 

Based in Cambridge, UK, Pragmatic Semiconductor, funded in part by the CIA’s investment branch In-Q-Tel, has created an ultra-thin, ultra-low-cost, flexible integrated circuit (FlexIC). Instead of relying on silicon, it is made from indium gallium zinc oxide at a fraction of the cost.

The application of the technology spans a wide range of sectors, including healthcare, pharmaceuticals, packaging and games. In the words of Pragmatics, it offers “digital traceability and interactivity to everyday objects.”

Scott White is the Founder and Executive Director, Strategic Initiatives, of Pragmatic. According to White, the company could end up leaving British shores if the UK government’s semiconductor strategy fails to meet expectations. 

So what would British politicians need to offer to provide adequate support to rival the allure of the US $52.7 billion CHIPS Act? White tells TNW that Pragmatic wants to see the government support innovative new companies through public procurement. 

“By creating home-grown revenue opportunities, and becoming a major customer for new semiconductor technologies addressing key national priorities such as net zero and affordable healthcare, the government can provide the reassurance and certainty that investors need to support startups and scaleups,” White said. 

Following the lead of Arm?

The current lack of ability to effectively raise funding for the business in the UK means that Pragmatic could move its operations overseas. Furthermore, it could potentially list outside of the UK in the future, following in the footsteps of Cambridge-compatriot Arm. Earlier this year, in a significant blow to London, the chip architecture giant and crown jewel in the UK tech industry chose to only list the company in New York.

What would a sufficient strategy look like in more detail? White believes that annual public sector procurement targets, commitments for public institutions to ‘buy British’, and encouraging public bodies, like NHS Trusts, to explore uses of the technology, would provide the required opportunities.

Furthermore, such a strategy would address both supply and demand, ultimately making “the UK a more attractive place from which innovative semiconductor companies can build and maintain a global base.” 

Funding from the government, the CIA and… China

After a Series C $125 million round (an oversubscription by more than 50%) late in 2022, the CIA’s investment branch In-Q-Tel, also referred to as IQT, owns part of Pragmatic. British Patient Capital, a subsidiary of the UK government’s economic development bank, also participated in the funding.

The company has now raised over $190 million to date and employs over 200 people. Puhua Capital, a Hangzhou-based VC focused on health and technology, has also invested an undisclosed amount. Although, Pragmatics has intentionally kept Chinese investment low, due the sensitive geopolitical situation. 

The geopolitics of chip-making capabilities

According to Chris Miller, the author of Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology, the process of designing and manufacturing chips is the most complex technological process that humans have ever undertaken. In Miller’s words, the supply chain needed to produce an advanced chip “stretches across multiple continents, involves some of the most purified materials, and the most precise machine tools ever made.” 

In 2022, the global semiconductor market size was over $​​573 billion, and is predicted to grow to $1,380.79 billion by 2029. Meanwhile, Miller further believes that it is not only a matter of business, economics or technology, but also a question of political relevance as to which countries have these capabilities and which don’t.

As such, successful startups like Pragmatic could find themselves caught in strategic tug-of-wars, stretching well beyond the scope of applied technological excellence. 

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New research milestone could solve quantum scalability

Europe, Next Featured, Tech / /
New research milestone could solve quantum scalability

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Wherever you fall on the quantum sceptic spectrum, you cannot deny that the potential of the technology is fascinating. Don’t worry, we will admit to not understanding it fully yet either, but the founders of QuiX Quantum do. 

Together with scientists from the Leibniz University Hannover, the team has demonstrated a fully-integrated quantum light source on a chip smaller than the size of a one-euro coin. 

The study, called “Fully on-chip photonic turnkey quantum source for entangled qubit/qudit state generation,” just FYI, was published in Nature Photonics this week. Its results could reportedly prove a game-changer for technologies such as quantum computing. 

Photonics offer temperature advantages

Quantum photonics is a field of research that explores the behaviour of light and its interactions with matter at the quantum level. Quantum light sources produce photons that can be used as quantum bits, or qubits. One of the main advantages of photonics compared to superconductor approaches is that it is compatible with room temperature operating conditions. 

However, most sources are external laser systems, making them bulky and non-reproducible and thus unsuitable for out-of-lab use or production at larger scale. Integrated, or on-chip sources are becoming popular due to being more compact and stable.

A fully-integrated light source, such as the one demonstrated by QuiX and Leibniz University scientists, will allow all stages of the Quantum Information Processing (QIP) to be on a single chip, which will lead to greater stability and scalability of the technology.

Plug-and-play photonics solutions

QuiX Quantum was founded in January 2019. Since then, the company has raised over €5.5 million in funding and already become the European market leader for quantum computing hardware based on photonics. They sold their first quantum processors in 2021, and are building 8- and 64-qubit Universal Quantum Computers worth €14 million for the German Aerospace Center. 

The company says its goal is “the continued disruption of quantum computing with our high-tech, scalable, future-proof, plug-and-play integrated photonic solutions.” Its recent breakthrough could not come at a better time. The EU has just launched a €19 million project to help quantum startups transition from lab to market. 

Earlier this year, QuiX Quantum took home the prestigious Prism Award for its 20-mode Quantum Photonic Processor. This award is known as the “Oscars of Photonics,” presented during the Photonics West conference in San Francisco.

“In four years, we went from an idea to delivering award-winning, market-leading hardware for photonic quantum computing,” Stefan Hengesbach, CEO of Quix, stated. “This awarded processor is the core element of our current generation quantum computers, which has already created a huge impact in the quantum ecosystem as an excellent tool to perform fundamental quantum mechanical experiments on-chip.

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Ireland’s Neuromod gets €30M to increase reach of tinnitus treatment tech

Europe, Insider, Next Featured, Tech / /

Anyone who has ever experienced phantom ringing in their ears knows that it is a nuisance to say the least. Those who have tinnitus – hearing continuous ringing, buzzing, humming or even roaring sounds – often experience anxiety and depression as a result. 

The condition affects approximately 15% of the global adult population. However, treatment has remained elusive, with those afflicted left to find their own ad hoc mitigation solutions. 

Neuromod, a medtech startup from Ireland, is looking to change that. The company has just received €30 million in funding to further commercialise its tinnitus treatment device, Lenire. 

A different kind of electrotherapy 

With its patented bimodal neuromodulation technology, Lenire works by sending mild electrical signals to the tongue, while patients listen to auditory stimulation through headphones. 

Thus far, over 700 patients have participated in clinical trials with the device, which consists of three parts. A handheld, lightweight controller allows the user to control timing, intensity and synchronisation of the stimuli, while Neuromod’s proprietary Tonguetip module sits in the user’s mouth, administering electrical pulses to the top of the tongue. Simultaneously, Bluetooth headphones deliver customised sound stimuli to the auditory nerve. 

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