When you read a headline about billboards using noise to charge electric cars, you might not believe it in the first place. But Peugeot, French automaker would like to make you think otherwise. To promote its newest 100% electric model, the e-208, the company put up a billboard in a Paris neighbourhood which uses thousands of acoustic sensors that absorb the noisy sounds of the city and turn it into energy. They used a technology called acoustic piezoelectricity– which is essentially an electric charge that uses sound vibrations and translates them into energy. For example, if you are using a voice recognition software on your computer, it uses acoustic piezoelectricity to turn the sound vibrations in your voice into electrical signals your computer can understand. But what are the logistics behind the ‘Recycle the noise, silence the city’ campaign and could this really solve the problem? Right at the moment, it can’t. As the billboard is currently a prototype and still has some issues. One of the issues is that the noise doesn’t generate enough energy to power the car without being supplemented by the city grid.
      But it’s still a compelling and creative concept. If other brands also step in and improvise upon this, they can contribute towards building the world of tomorrow by exploring new areas of innovation in the electrification of their vehicle range and eliminate the kinds of city sounds being harnessed around us.