Korea's Recharging Roads

Over at PhysOrg via Gizmodo, the have an article about Korea's recharging roads,

South Korea has overhauled its public transport network with recharging roads, where the vehicles use power from buried electric strips in the road. It was invented at the University of California, before South Korea adopted it for an amusement park.

 Read the rest here.

It seems like they're thinking about using some sort of magnetic induction to charge the batteries which seems wise, but I don't know how efficient it's going to be. I was kinda hoping for the part where kids put their tongue on the track for a little zap, you know, like with a 9V battery. There's already the Palm Pre with it's magnetic induction charger, but that's not a bus.  We'll see. I know there are a lot of skeptics out there that feel that "green" technology is more wasteful that what is currently out there. I don't have an opinion either way. I'm more concerned with costs. If it costs more in the beginning, but over time the cost is recouped, then I'm satisfied.