Are we Ready for the Air Car?

About two weeks ago I was in my very good friend Sherri’s wedding. At the reception my fellow matron of honor, Meagan, mentioned the new Air-Car. I honestly hadn’t heard a drop of news on the new breed of green.

After doing some web searching I found this idea isn’t so new. According to The Air Car website the concept of using compressed air to power transportation has been around since the late 1800’s. First being used to power street transit using a single -stage engine. According to history:

“It represented an extremely important advance in terms of pneumatic engines, due to its forward thinking use of thermodynamics, ensuring that the air was heated, by passing it through tanks of boiling water, also increasing its range between fill-ups.”

Charles B. Hodges is known to have applied the “compressed air concept” to the car. These cars were used in the United States to power little worker vehicles (not the oopma loompa type) for miners. In 1979 Terry Miller put together the first vehicle for a whopping $1500.00 which was patented in 1983.

Now all of a sudden it’s a big huge new idea for all us Americans. Many technological years later this is what we have:

• Production of these vehicles cuts down on cost by 20%
• No corrosion from batteries
• Easy Maintenance
• Compressed Air Bottles are Recyclable and have a longer life span
• At low speeds only air is emitted. At higher speeds when gasoline is needed to heat the engine there is still only 0.141 lbs./CO2 per mile being emitted (This is 4 times less the amount of CO2 produced by non-hybrid vehicles)

You may ask about refueling. Here’s what I found on EcoGeek:

“Refueling is simple and will only take a few minutes. That is, if you live nearby a gas station with custom air compressor units. The cost of a fill up is approximately $2.00. If a driver doesn’t have access to a compressor station, they will be able to plug into the electrical grid and use the car’s built-in compressor to refill the tank in about 4 hours.”

It all sounds sooooo good! Even if we do have some wrinkles to iron out so be it, at least we’re on our way to marketing a vehicle that doesn’t rely 100% on gasoline. I do fear that what was once America’s first energy powered vehicle the EV1 may be the outcome of the Air-Car. You guys should rent Who Killed the Electric Car, it will blow your mind and piss you off a little.

Let’s hope this sticks!