How cool is that!
and they would be very popular in the US, where the automaker TATA has a name that’s slang for boobies, our national obsession.
It’s a decent idea, but compared to other polution free technology being developed it’s a real dud.
The compressed air used to run the car is compressed by using tradition poluting methods of energy production. Granted cutting out the emmisions given by the car it’s self it a help so there are some advantages there.
There is major energy loss due to friction. The Air car is esentialy a gasoline style piston motor that uses the pressure from the tanks to move the piston and rods which turn a crankshaft. With moving part like that I do belive oil would be needed, unless they are using a dry lubicant. The use of a dry lubricant is possible because of the decreased temperature due to lack of combustion, but I’m conserned about how they could keep the teperatures low enough on the crank bearings.
It’s nice that it can be plugged in and recharge it’s self, but then again you are using that polluting electricity source.
A much better technology to be concerned about it the fuel cell for obviouse reasons. Zero emisions, and the future hydrogen gas station will most likely be self operational and run off of solar energy only.
I’d compare the air car to mini disc players. Yes they were a wonderful idea, but they were shortly trumped by the iPod (fuel cell).
I do think it’s an awsome design, but the technology it by no mean inovative.
Oh, and a fuel cell car could potentialy provide your home with electricity, slowly removing the need for electric companies except for energy distrobution created by other peoples fuel cells when the power is sold back to the grid.
Imagine, everybodies cars powering the country, hydrogen powering the cars, and the sun powering the hydrogen station. It’s brilliant.
The only downfall is that eventualy the sun will burn out. Pherhaps by then we will have created a biological energy source that runs off of waste produced by people and industry. Oh, we will need a new planet too, because the sun will engulf the earth as it burns out.
yeah i hate to piss on the parade too, but it’s too damn small.
everyone and their mother seems to think they have extra-special hauling needs that requires them to have a SUV. Getting Americans to go back to compacts is as much a challenge as getting americans to get rid of their cars altogether.
Kudos to TaTa tho for coming up with it. They should go ahead a release in India and perhaps China - it’s not going to affect American pollution output (we’ll have to figure out a way to do that ourselves) but it could mitigate pollution output in these 2 emerging economies.
It could potentialy decrease air polution if they were used in a large scale throughout a smog filled city.
Every time they were plugged in to recharge the tanks the cars could act as air filtration units slowly pulling toxins out of city air. (to bad everybody would just buy full tanks to negate the 3-4 hr wait)
Yes, but we’ve got another 3 billion years left to worry about that.
I have a fealing that we won’t worry about it until it’s a major problem (like everything else)
And we’ll have a new Administration, no Katrina effect!
you know what I’ve wondered?
the permafrost in siberia is thawing out due to global warming right?
why can’t we harness the methane that it’s releasing, and put it to good use?
Probably for the same reason we don’t collect all the methane from landfills. (we do in some, but not all) People are lazy, and go for the most convenient solution.
Or even one of the most common sources, cow farts!!
i don’t know that it’s laziness tho. I think a lot of it has to do with who is willing to pay for it. I don’t think we’re lazy so much as cheap, and short-sighted.
I didn’t know we collected methane from landfills tho - do you have any links on how that works?
Granted Russia is in a wierd financial place now, but they’ve already got some of the infrastructure across siberia (namely pipelines) it just seems like it would be a natural moneymaker for some willing gangster.
Sure, look HERE!
thanks mtnjim!
sweet it’s got diagrams and everything.
Therein also lies the rub for me. I have to buy so-called “luxury” cars (eg Oldmobile 88/Buick LeSaber(Lucerne)/etc) just to get a trunk/boot large enough to accomodate a folding wheelchair or wheeled walker for my caregiving duties (and something you can’t see inside to tempt theives like a mini-van or the like). Plus as a man with a “stocky” build I find the lack of headroom and shoulder/arm room hazardous in many smaller cars.
Hazardous for sure. I almost bought a 90 celica GTS 4 track (turbo, awd, leather, easy to build, drool) but I had to pass it up, because when I stalled it with the sun roof open, I bashed my forehead on the front of the opening. An accident with any decent forward momentum would surely have broken my neck or sheared of the top of my skull.
I like small cars, but some are to small for a big person, and it’s to dangerous to drive in.
see you have a valid hauling need. 2 kids and groceries, imo, aren’t a valid hauling need.
and i understand what y’all are saying about headroom. I will say this tho - my 4door sedan has enough room (for a folding wheelchair, in the trunk, ncidentally), and headroom, to accomodate people over 6ft tall.
and it gets soemthing like 38mpg.
compare that to an SUV that gets what? 12-15?
and the thing is - it’s not the SUVs themselves that are the problem - I wouldn’t have a problem with them if they were getting great gas mileage too, but by law they are not required to get great gas mileage, therefore no one actually builds them to get great gas mileage.
it’s funny - i jsut watched An Inconvenient Truth over the weekend, and at one point Gore touched on the MPG differences and regulations between different countries. Sad to say the US is at the very bottom of the pile, both in mpg requirements and the construction of cars.
Apparently Detroit’s excuse is “we just can’t build cars with great gas mileage. it’s ‘unpossible’.” which is sad.