The air car is poised for mass production
A French engineer's uber-green invention may become more than just an environmentalist's dream - a car with zero emissions.
Comments
When will I Guy Negre go to jail?
Irritates me these dirtbag publications gives criminals free press, and one the publications realize they've been had, do nothing about it.
August 2011. Still no production. Perhaps "next year". That's what MDI said back in 1998 and has said again almost every year since.
Yet even today there are still gullible journalists that breathlessly report that production of the compressed air car will start "next year".
I think a car with no oil usage is far more safe than one that uses oil. Thats just for a start
The concept works, but energywise it's not as efficient as an electric car.
It's an interesting idea, but definitely not very green.
i am doing a report on this
Hey, it's 2011 now - where is this aircar being manufactured?
When has anybody taken a prototype for a 100 km test drive?
This entire thing is an absolutely SCAM. Why do you scumbag idiots advertise scams, and when everybody points out that it's a scam, you pretend you never printed the article?
Wake up AMERICA! Brazil has been running their vehicles on compressed air for YEARS!! Yes, it works. And it works well.
Many thanks to the author. It is incomprehensible to me now, but in general, the usefulness and significance is overwhelming.
Virtually everything about MDI and the air car are lies pure and simple.
None of the claims made by MDI has ever been independently verified.
The announcements by MDI about impending production are simply to lure those with money and no knowledge of science so that they can have some cash to play with for a while longer.'
Lies simply lies.
Can anyone tell me of any news about this car being made in the US. Is it happening or not...
The MDI company sells only manufacturing license to naive investors, not car...never. It's a scam.
Yeah, this is an old scam- every year, the scammers pick a nation, claim that production is almost, almost ready to begin, make some impressive claims, take advance orders, take the money, and run.
Don't be fooled. Don't pay money up front. Ask to test drive one before you send them a dime.
Any vehicle that gets any power at all from the grid can never be truly listed as "zero emission". Since this car requires the air in the tanks to be compressed by a pump that you plug in, it still contributes to carbon emissions, albeit not directly from the car's tailpipe.
There are only a few current technologies which can be used to create true "zero emission" cars: Hydrogen fuel cells, solar power, or nuclear. And of course each of these has their own problems.
This is the same thing I have been saying forever. Unless you have a solar/wind-powered charging area for the car, it is absolutely not zero-emissions.
Honestly, I think Hydrogen Fuel is the way to go. It can create the largest amounts of power without clutter, and it works at night, without dangerous radiation. The only problem is the price, which is projected to be down to the middle-class range by 2025.
Wow... 300 bars... that's 4351.14 PSI
What happens in an accident when the tank gets dinged? Ever seen those safety videos where they chop the valve off a SCUBA tank? Think air-powered rocket with no guidance...
If this is real, and could really work, that would be incredible! This would help the environment so much! And it's cheap! I would buy it when it comes out!! Also they should make them for places like China and India, where the pollution is really bad. I love it :)
Sure, we will have less emissions from vehicles, but now every home will have to use an equivalent amount of energy from their power lines. Increased demand for energy leads to higher production of energy. Most U.S. power companies use fossil fuels as their energy source. What does this really save? Nothing.
Many preferred to use electric cars for a convenient usage. Also this helps lessening the C02 emission. Toxic assets, toxic swine flu, and so on, but the word have been popping up more than would seem normal. The word itself comes from the Greek, referring to poison that archers would dip their arrows into. (Etymologies are so cool, if you're into that sort of thing.) Right now, toxic is the state of unemployment. Job-hunting is going on at a massive scale; people are clamoring for job.... More
solar, wind, and other green sources of energy could be used to produce energy and compressed air could be a storage system in cars or in homes. a compressed air tank may be cheaper than more batteries and easier to recycle, etc
This is old recycled garbage. MDI announced "production soon" every year or so.
The fact that Miguel Celades is being quoted dates this article as being at least a year old. That's when Miguel Celades and MDI parted company. Acrimoniously. With lawsuits and accusations flying.
There is no future for this concept. It requires extremely light craft and big air tanks. It's good for golf cart style cars, for field and factory use, maybe even as an ATV, but it would never be practical for transportation, except in the case of public transportation that can "refuel" at it's stops (good idea for subways, really). The issues of moisture throughout the entire machine alone is enough to make it infeasible.
60 miles = 96.56 km
3,500 psi = 24,161.65 kpa
500 miles = 804.67 km
160 miles per (assume US) gallon = 68 km/L
The article doesn't say anything about cold weather performance. This is a key issue in Canada, northern Europe, Russia and northern US states.
Ok so let me see if I get this straight...
“It can be used in cars, in commercial vehicles and in power generation.”
Power GENERATION? wow this must be some new advancement I hadn't heard about.
"The Air Car works similarly to electric cars, but rather than storing electrical energy in a heavy battery, the vehicle converts energy into air pressure and stores it in a tank."
Not sounding good...
"An onboard air compressor can be plugged into a regular.... More
Nice Idea but... whats the advantage? This technology was patented first in the 19th century and was used with locomotives in mines. They were found to be lacking in range and if you think about it, there is no fuel advantage here. It costs as much or more to charge up an air tank as it does to fill it with gas for that range, and offers no range advantage over electric cars. Just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you SHOULD, and that's why investors are understandable cautious.
Lord, is this scam still going on? For road use the physics just don't pan out. It's a scam pure and simple. Compressed air vehicles work for such things as small fork lifts or motorised trolleys in warehouses, but for long distance travel the laws of thermodynamics still hold. Crap range equals no air cars.
Guy Negre, at Paris Auto Show 2002 "Our plant Carros in the Alpes-Maritimes is now fully operational," says Guy Negro. Our prototypes give excellent results. The approval should pose no problem. "
Needless to say, that is what Guy Negre is now saying at the Geneva Auto Show, 2009.
Why wait for a factory in Andorra. There is one already built in Italy, back in 2004.
It's still waiting for parts from MDI.
.... More
Indeed some things are outdated. The picture is of one of the early prototypes that will never go into production. But I have been to the MDI stand in the Geneva Car Show only a few days ago. The air cars have evolved and they will be tested under contract this very year 2009 by AirFrance and KLM airways as well as by the city services of the French city of Nice. A second MDI plant in Andorra is under construction and will be finished within three months. So we will soon know all about the.... More
The Andorra factory manufactures LED lights today, the air car production has been canceled by the owners of this factory.
This year old article is out-of-date in several ways. Miguel Celades and MDI have parted company, complete with accusations flying both ways.
Tata has NOT made any air cars and says that they are still a long ways off.
What hasn't changed is that the air car will go into production "real soon now". That has been its status since MDI and Zero Pollution Motors announced the e.Volution air car back in 2000, with production to start in 2001 in France, 2002 in South Africa. .... More
