Six years ago, Laurence Kemball-Cook had a brainwave. A graduate of Loughborough university, he was doing a placement year at the energy company Eon, where he was given the job of finding a way to power street lighting with solar energy and wind. It didn\u2019t work, he says, in part because there\u2019s a lot of shade in cities. This got him thinking about other potential sources of power in busy urban spaces. The answer, he realised, was underneath his feet.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy idea was a floor tile that would convert the kinetic energy from a footstep into electricity,\u201d he says. \u201cEvery time someone steps on the tile, they generate seven watts of power. The energy is stored within batteries, and then used to power lighting when it\u2019s needed. It\u2019s an off-grid power source for cities.\u201d We are talking in the headquarters of Pavegen <\/span><\/a>in King\u2019s Cross. He set up the company in 2009 but it took several years to develop the technology and convince people to take it on.<\/p>\n Since then, Pavegen has worked with brands such as Coca-Cola and Siemens. The company has tiles at Heathrow terminal three and are planning an installation outside the White House. During last year\u2019s World Cup, it went into a favela in Rio and laid a whole football pitch with tiles, hooking them up to spotlights so that play could continue after dark.<\/p>\n Light isn\u2019t the only thing it generates. When Kemball-Cook and I have a go on the demo tiles in the Pavegen office, our jumping around causes a radio to turn on. And there\u2019s another, potentially more powerful application. \u201cWhen you stand on a tile, it sends out wireless data. This is useful for crowdflow modelling \u2013 seeing how people move through cities. You can use it to control lighting more efficiently. It\u2019s also a really key way for retailers to know how many people are visiting their shops. We imagine Google will cover streets with this in the future and use the data in interesting ways.\u201d<\/p>\n