Cheap solar-power car conversion kit, for the residents of sunny Bournemouth : Tech Digest

Japan's (impenetrable foreign web site alert) Total Mobility Project thinks it has come up with the answer to our dependence on spending £1 a litre for car juice.

Seven solar panels are the answer, installed at a cost of about £10k, which allow this once mighty Mazda Roadster to trundle along at a max speed of 62mph. Its batteries last for 18 miles.

This development is not going to get Jeremy Clarkson on the phone asking to borrow one for the weekend, but it is at least a good start. Maybe our children's children's children's children's children's children will have decent solar cars after all.

Sadly, the energy benefits of a solar-powered car are ruined by living in the UK - the light bulbs required to charge the vehicle for a two mile journey would burn £2.1million of electricity.

(Via Digital World Tokyo)