Eli5: Amid of soaring gasoline and electricity prices, why aren’t we seeing solar powered cars making to the mainstream?

Question

Eli5: Amid of soaring gasoline and electricity prices, why aren’t we seeing solar powered cars making to the mainstream?

In: 1

Answer 1

solar powered cars also don’t have enough surface area to have enough solar panels to run a car a consumer would want.

at the equator at high noon on an equinox (peak solar power as the sun is directly overhead), there’s around 1000w of solar energy per square meter.

1000w is a bit under 1hp (horsepower).

now consider that extremely efficient (and therefore extremely expensive) solar panels are roughly 30% efficient, you are pulling *tops* 300w (a bit under ⅓hp) per square meter.

if the vehicle in question is pretty big, say 3x4m, this gives us 12m^2, multiply by 300w and we get 3600w in absolutely perfect/ideal conditions, a fair bit less in most normal conditions. this is roughly 3.6hp… less power than a decent lawnmower.