In 2008, India’s largest car manufacturer announced that it would begin production of world’s first commercial vehicle to run on nothing but compressed air.
In the search for the ultimate clean car, we’ve seen concept vehicles that run on everything from solar power to algae, but most are expensive and require hard-to-find fuels. Wouldn’t it be nice to find a car that ran on something that’s plentiful and free?
In 2008, India’s largest car manufacturer announced that it would begin production of world’s first commercial vehicle to run on nothing but a puff of air — compressed air, that is.
The Air Car concept, developed by the French company Motor Development International (MDI) in partnership with Indian giant Tata Motors, would have used compressed air, as opposed to the gas-and-oxygen explosions of internal-combustion models, to push its engine’s pistons.
The car was said to achieve speeds of up to 68 mph with a range of 125 miles between fill-ups, all for less than $13,000.
The concept itself is delightful: When your vehicle gets low on fuel, you pull into a station to fill it up. But instead of stopping at the gas pump, you roll over to the customized compression unit, insert the nozzle into your tank instead of your tires, and fill up on nothing but $2 worth of clean air.
Unfortunately, the dates for the Air Car’s much-publicized release in both Indian and American markets have come and gone with no word about when the vehicle might actually hit the streets.
In 2009, Tata Motors’ Vice President of Engineering, S. Ravishankar admitted that the project was facing difficulties in terms of vehicle range and cooling. At that time, Ravishankar declined to say whether the company was officially calling off the project, but commented that excessively low engine temperature caused by the compressed air was a major problem.
Although the Tata version of the zero-emissions car might never make it into commercial production, a more credible version is currently being developed by a duo of mechanical engineering professors in India.
Bharat Raj Singh and Onkar Singh’s plans are decidedly more modest than the world domination predicted by Tata and MDI, which is why many think they have a chance of succeeding in India.
According to Popular Mechanics, “The two plan to refit India’s scooters with an air-compression motor that is about three-quarters of a foot in diameter. In the engine’s schematics, a tank of compressed air fires into the chambers of a turbine whose axis is set off-center from its housing. The vanes of the turbine extend as they rotate, allowing the chambers to accommodate the volume of air as it expands and contributes to the drive.”
Unlike the Air Car, the retrofitted scooters would run off the pressure it takes to fill a tire at the gas station (about 60 pounds per square inch). The Tata/MDI version had 4,350 psi in its tanks, which would require stations to install new high-tech air pumps, a difficult investment for station owners in a developing country like India.
Although Singh and Singh are hoping to eventually solve engineering problems related to torque and range for their scooters (which currently only hold enough air to travel 18 miles), it might be a while until they can really solve the emissions problem.
It’s important to remember that while vehicles running on only compressed air might seem like an environmental miracle, they still have a carbon footprint.
“Companies manufacturing air vehicles usually fail to consider that the energy needed to compress the air into their tanks comes from the electrical grid,” Lee Schipper, a project scientist at the University of California – Berkeley, told Popular Mechanics. In a country like India, which relies heavily on dirty coal-fired power plants, the use of thousands of compressed air vehicles would actually increase the total emissions sent into the atmosphere.
For now, consumers wanting a clean, efficient vehicle might be well advised to consider the many electric-powered cars and bikes already available on the market.
What Happened to the Compressed-Air Car? – 1-800-Recycling | World of car News
January 13th, 2011
[...] post: What Happened to the Compressed-Air Car? – 1-800-Recycling This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged first-commercial, india. Bookmark the [...]
joez
January 31st, 2011
Another way to use compressed air to power vehicles would be a plug in compressed air electric hybrid. Here is how it could be done. When the vehicle is charging (on regular house current) an electric motor is powering a multistage piston air compressor both of which are part of the vehicle. The motor and compressor are cooled by standard auto antifreeze solution which transfers the heat of compression to an insulated tank filled with paraffin or a eutectic salt solution. The compressor and the air tank(s) would also be insulated to minimize heat loss.
When the vehicle is running the compressor becomes a multistage air expansion engine, similar to the old triple expansion steam engines. The stored heat would be used to reheat the expanding air which increases its energy. This reheating can be boosted by using the waste(exhaust) heat from a small gasoline engine. This is a form of co-generation. The gas engine would provide extra power and the waste heat would boost the power output of the compressed air engine. The gas engine would not be used during the first 10-15 miles of driving unless it was highway driving.
A compressed air piston engine does not need a transmission and it is good for regenerative braking. This technology could reduce usage of expensive electric batteries. It is better suited for trucks and buses rather than cars and motor scooters
anant
February 28th, 2011
mr. lee schipper is the biggest fool i hv ever come through, weather it is india or america the sum total of carbon released by power plants will be much-much lesser than the sum total by vechiles.
Jorg
March 1st, 2011
What you failed to mention is that batteries also require grid electricity, just as the compressed air does. Plus there is no disposal of toxic wastes at the end of 10 years or so as there is with batteries.
steve g
March 6th, 2011
The oil cartels don’t want it, so it will never happen! The technology is here, and now its gone, big surprise. Hello $5.00 a gallon gas, good bye economy! Humanity sucks…..
BOB
March 12th, 2011
STEVE G HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD!!! No money in air
David B
April 10th, 2011
What an embarrassment for humanity. Not implementing this technology really disturbes me. I’m sick of hearing about technologys that work but never make it to consumers. A real world leader needs to step up and end the process that is leading to the destruction of our planet just to meet some bottom line or to pacify some foriegn country. Robbing the earth of all it’s natural resources can have but only one outcome. I wish I could get my hands on one of those air powered cars. If gas gets any higher, the only way I’ll be getting around is pedal power. God help us.
joez
June 21st, 2011
This is a followup comment to my previous submittal. Compressing air produces a lot of heat. This heat can be used to help boil water in evaporator. A two cylinder steam engine running in reverse-powered by the electric motor-would draw steam from the evaporator, compress it and pump it into a steam accumulator. A steam accumulator is a heavily insulated boiler without the fire tubes. It has water in it to absorb heat from the steam as it becomes hotter and more pressurized.
When the vehicle is running, both steam and air engines would both run. The exhaust steam from the low pressure cylinder goes back into the evaporator which has become a condenser and reheats the expanding compressed air that is being used by the air engine.
At 450 psia pressure water is 456 degrees F. This can provide a total amount of heat energy of 244 BTU/lb going through the steam engine. About 10% or 24 BTU/lb would become steampower. The other 90% would reheat the compressed air. If the temperature in the accumulator can then be further transferred to the evaporator/condenser (perhaps by an oil cooling loop) an additional 150-170 BTU/lb can be utilized. At 400 BTU/lb it would take 312 pounds of water-about 38 US gallons to store the heat energy of 1 gallon of gasoline. This works out to 0.422 MJ/lb or 0.93 MJ/Kg = 930,000 Joules/Kg. This compares favorably with Lithium-ion batteries that store 460,000 Joules/Kg. It also contains 258 wh/liter which compares favorably with Lithium-ion batteries at 230 wh/liter.
This combines 2 old technologies that worked reasonably well, the fireless steam locomotive and the Mekarski system of using a hot water container to extend the range of the compressed air trolley car. This dual power source would be bulkier than batteries because of the compressed air tanks and heat retaining insulation but it could work.
Patrick
June 22nd, 2011
Why would you need to leave a footprint at all? FIx the heating issues and move on… Solar panels are availble to everyone and anyone at anytime. Every house and business in America should be using solar by now anyway. We do not need a grid fueld by coal… The author should have seen this. I dont know about anyone else but my small compressor fills a 300 lb tank in about 2 minutes. We need 2 tanks, one fills while the other is being used. You run the compressor motor on the Ion Lithium batteries in the trunk charged by the solar on roof, energy from brakes, energy from tires rotating.
Johan
July 7th, 2011
This is a bad idea, compressed air has very low efficiency, only about 15% of the energy required to compress the air in the first place will be available for the actual engine output. Rest of the energy is lost at multiple places like heat. So in a sense this would use much more energy than a fully electric vehicle.
Joez
July 8th, 2011
In response to Johan;
He is right if you let the heat of compression just dissipate. This is fine for scuba diving tanks where the objective is to store as much air as possible. What we need here is to store energy. Most of the heat of compression can be stored in tanks of paraffin. Everything would be insulated so heat loss would be minimized. This can be supplemented by the waste heat from a gasoline or diesel engine, which works well for hybrid cars.
With a hybrid car or truck configuration it is possible to compress the air with stationary compessors and use the heat of compression for other purposes such as commercial bread baking, heating hot water, and other process heat applications. This could get rid of the paraffin tanks and the extra insulation inside the vehicle. In this type of situation it would also be possible to run the air compressors using stationary natural gas fueled engines. The waste heat from these engines can also be used for process heat. This however would be only useful as a form of industrial/commercial cogeneration. It could be energy efficient.
CHEF Lucas
July 23rd, 2011
Patrick Is Very Correct In Saying Patrick
June 22nd, 2011
Why would you need to leave a footprint at all? FIx the heating issues and move on… Solar panels are availble to everyone and anyone at anytime. Every house and business in America should be using solar by now anyway. We do not need a grid fueld by coal… The author should have seen this. I dont know about anyone else but my small compressor fills a 300 lb tank in about 2 minutes. We need 2 tanks, one fills while the other is being used. You run the compressor motor on the Ion Lithium batteries in the trunk charged by the solar on roof, energy from brakes, energy from tires rotating.
Tata should make this car
August 4th, 2011
TATA should help all the citizens of India who struggle with gas prices by manufacturing this car. It will lead our country forward!
Ian H
August 14th, 2011
It’s a SCAM people. MDI has been selling licences to distributors and promising deliveries for YEARS. The best range the AirPod ever achieved was 15km. The Negres are laughing all the way to the bank.
Steve
August 16th, 2011
So Joez, you are up to a vehicle with four engines (compressed air, small gasoline, steam and electric) + insulated tanks of parafin (size, volume, weight?) and a boiler full of water (again – size, volume, weight?) and all the systems to keep everything self-contained. Not sure it would be able to move itself, let alone the vehicle big enough to house and synchronize all of the above. A tank solid enough to hold the 4,500+ psi stated in the article, AND be able to survive a highway-speed collision without rupturing and making a bad situation worse, would be fairly heavy, decreasing efficiency. Same with the boiler and steam piping systems.
Like most up-and-coming replacement technologies, this (compressed air) is not yet ready for mass production. And don’t buy into the clap-trap about the oil industry blocking these things. Most oil companies would be very happy to not have to produce gasoline, one of the more expensive, lowest profit margin products possible from a barrel of oil. As for solar cells, do some reseach on the toxic and caustic chemicals used to make the solar cells, and how those chemicals are disposed of, and you may come away with a preference to stay oil-based. Same goes for the strip-mining to get the lithium necessary for rechargeable batteries in the plug-in electrics. Then think of the massive amounts of the above necessary to mass produce enough solar or plug-in electrics to replace all the current gas and diesel powered vehicles currently in use, and you’re looking at an environmental disaster bigger than Valdez and Deep Water Horizon combined. Not saying we shouldn’t continue to persue those technologies, but let true science and the market drive the process, not government fiat or junk-science hysteria, and we’ll get there much sooner.
kendunn
September 26th, 2011
Anyone that has ever used an air tool knows this will never work. A huge tank to run a tool not much bigger than your hand. Yes, I know the pressure in the car is a lot more, but still…..
mikey
October 18th, 2011
So Steve is the CEO of BP I take it…
solar panels are made from petro products only Steve… you are huffing way too many diesel fumes to not think this was squashed by big oil. McCain and Palin lost dood, so take your drill baby drill crap and go home preferably to a garage to run your car in with the door shut. The reason they are complaining about the lack of heat is to heat the cab for comfort you idiot. the drivetrain is sound.
gman
October 24th, 2011
If you have never taken a thermodynamics course, please stop commenting on these things. The idea of using coal/natural gas to produce electricity, then distributing the electricity over power lines to run a motor to drive a compressor to then produce compressed air that is then decompressed through a turbine to drive a car is absolutely laughable. I can’t imagine anything less efficient (<10%). You can go on and on with a myriad of ideas to recover the waste heat all you want. This is the dumbest idea ever conceived. There is a reason gasoline engines still dominate the market place. Gasoline is easily transported, easily pumped, easily stored, and has a very high energy density. Are there cleaner options? Sure. Will other fuels and alternatives eventually replace gasonline? Sure. But, compressed air is not one of them!
J Meagher
November 20th, 2011
Ok, what really didn’t happen is that no one produced a 80 mpg vehicle in 1991, so we got more politically involved in the middle east. It was probably possible, albeit smaller, lighter and thus less safe, and mostly not high enough profit margin to satisfy the Lords of GM. Subsequently bankrupted an reorganized after taxpayer bailout as guess what-GM-but my stock was worthless, new shares selling at $32. As for alternatives-ethanol and other types of potentially useful combustibles made from not food crops but agricultural and industrial clean waste along with whatever might work according to our thermodynamic geniuses…
Andre
November 21st, 2011
For a while I have been following this topic and indeed never heard from MDI again. I wondered if there might be a light version compressed-air engine to be used in a bycicle. A partner of mine now produces a kind of electric bikes, but this air-type solution sounds much more interesting. Anyone out there who would happen to know where to find working solutions in the market?
On internet I only find solutions with a high hobby-level… I need to know if this alternative is liable for biking; I am looking for answers about what pressure is needed, what the efficiency is with respect to volume (should be ok, for a bike is much lighter then a car and actieradius in biking is restricted to let’s say 30-50 km!), etc.
Anyone?
Beth
November 21st, 2011
Hi Andre, I found this recently: it’s a compressed air motorcycle that can achieve speeds of over 60 mph.
http://crispgreen.com/2011/11/prototype-racing-bike-runs-on-compressed-air/
Andre
November 27th, 2011
Thanks Beth, I already found that article but like your comment.
I am looking for a knwon and tested prototype like that motorcycle, but I am mainly interested in ‘light versions’. The MDI concept looked simple and potentially downgradable for lighter objects like bycicles. Can this concept still be produced under license or…? And does it work?
joez
December 15th, 2011
There is another way to make a compressed air-electric hybrid. When the car is charging the electric motor would power a centrifugal or axial flow compressor (which ever is more efficient) that would pressurize the air in 4 stages. The 1st stage would compress ambient air to 5 bar pressure and store it in a small tank. When this tank reached 4 to 5 bar pressure the air from it would be fed into the same compressor-using a different input valve and pumped into a 2nd tank at 20-25 bar. This process would be repeated 2 more times, into an 80-90 bar tank and then into a 300-320 bar tank. The heat of compression would be saved by using standard automotive cooling technology to heat up a tank filled with 100-150 pounds of paraffin.
It is possible to nest these tanks with the highest pressure tank inside the 2nd highest pressure tank, inside the 3rd highest pressure tank, inside the lowest pressure tank.
When the car is running the compressed air would be run through 2 stages of air turbines-a high pressure and a low pressure. These would be run at full power-for maximum efficiency-only when necessary to assist battery powered electric traction motors. The compressor motor would become a DC generator. The heat stored in the molten paraffin would reheat the expanding air.
The most obvious question is why use a turbo-electric system instead of a compound piston direct drive. The main reason is that turbines running at full power are more energy efficient than piston engines, however full power isn’t usually required so blending in turbo-electric power with battery power can be energy efficient. Modern power electronics can handle this. The air turbines would be automatically run when batteries were discharged enough to be recharged or when power requirements exceeded 50% of the car’s maximum needs, acceleration or a certain minimum speed.
The 2nd reason for making this system a hybrid with electric battery system is that compressed air systems drop in power output as the pressure drops and there has to be some way to compensate for this power loss.
The advantage to this somewhat complicated system is that it would reduce the amount and cost of lithium-ion or nickel-cadmium batteries needed. If the car were also a gasoline hybrid the exhaust heat from that engine could add heat energy to the air turbines.
fieldwarp
January 2nd, 2012
i think what happen here is that there are powerful interest group that is behind to delay or even stop the car from even reaching the market…
imagine what would happen to the oil prices….
Felix
January 16th, 2012
The oil companies will always win.
If we discover someday that spitting in the gas tank will increase the miles per gallon ten times what your car is currently getting, the the oil companies WOULD INCREASE THE COST OF A GALLON OF GAS TEN TIMES WHAT THE CURRENT PRICE WAS. The oil companies will never let their billions of dollars of profit they make each year go down.
Remember that the oil companies definition of supply and demand is that THEY WILL SUPPLY US WITH WHATEVER THEY WISH TO SUPPLY US, AND THAT THEY WILL DEMAND THAT WE PAY WHATEVER THEY WISH TO CHARGE US. Yes, that is corporate law of supply and demand at its best.
Armando Regusci
January 18th, 2012
I am doing and saling bikes in Uruguay, and very soon cars and buses thar run only with compressed air.
Felix
January 20th, 2012
One more example of the oil companies always winning. If half of the world buys the compressed air cars and cuts the world’s use of gasoline in half, then the oil companies will simply DOUBLE the price of gasoline. It might work well for the owners of compressed air cars (I personaly would like to own one), but the oil compaines will still make their obscene profits by making gasoline car owners pay double the current price of gasoline.
Here is one more thought about oil companies. By robbing us of our “spendable” income by continually raising prices every time the economy starts improving, they can keep the entire country in poverty. When every one has less spendable income because of rising prices, then everyone has less money to spend in stores or for mortgage payments, etc. That means more people are layed off and there is absolutely nothing the government can do about it. WELL, MAYBE THERE IS SOMETHING THE GOVERNMENT CAN DO. THE GOVERNMENT CAN NATIONALIZE THE OIL COMPANIES OR DEMAND THAT ALL OIL (GAS) PRODUCED IN OUR COUNTY BE SOLD FOR TWO DOLLARS A GALLON, AND REQUIRE THAT ABSOLUTELY NONE OF THE OIL PRODUCED IN OUR COUNTRY BE EXPORTED TO OTHER COUNTRIES.
Irshaad
January 23rd, 2012
I’m confused. As a someone who knows nothing about this technology aside from the the claims of cheaply fueled transport, I don’t get it.
1. Some say the technology works and that it is sustainable.
2. Others (those in the know) say that this technology may well work but it also takes a lot of energy to get air to that kind of compression…i.e…it will need a of of electricity which means burning more coal at the power plants which essentially defeats the purpose.
3. Then there are those who openly blame the oil companies and even the CIA for the bad press that this air car is getting.
So what is the case actually?
Brian Paul Wiegand
January 25th, 2012
As noted by some, the compression of a gas gives off heat; this constitutes an energy loss. Some have argued that this loss can be countered by insulation to prevent the heat from escaping, or by capturing the heat for use to drive steam turbine, etc. Bottom line is: there will always be a certain amount of energy loss, a certain inefficiency, in compressing gas, whether through heat, vibration, or sound. This loss might be reduced by strenuous efforts along the lines noted, but the resulting remaining inefficiency must be considered in addition to the prime mover, the gasoline engine, electric motor, or whatever that is used to power the pump that compresses the gas. Then there is the problem of the gas expansion to drive a vehicle. Just as compression of a gas is exothermic, producing heat, using a pump in reverse to supply power as a gas expands is endothermic. Heat is absorbed from the pump/motor itself and from the ambient surroundings. Such a pump/motor would have a tendency to “freeze-up” (seize) after an appropriate period of operation, and possibly also accumulate a large amount of ice drawn from ambient humidity. Attempts to heat the motor, lines, valves, etc., just adds to the energy loss.
Even if all the thermal problems can addressed, there still is the practical matter of specific energy storage density; can a compressed gas system store enough energy per its weight to be practical? At present, electrical energy systems have far better specific energy density, and yet even they are not quite ready for general practical use. In fact, an energy storage system (motor) can not compete with an energy producing system (engine) in terms of specific energy density. This battle was decided over a hundred years ago when the internal combustion engine triumphed over electric, hybrid (Lohner-Porsche, etc.), and steam propulsion for automobiles; automobiles require high specific energy densities to be practical,
Irshaad Ally
January 25th, 2012
Thanks Brian,
I get the offset of heat problem with the compressed air engine.
I’ve also heard of another technology called the KEPPE MOTOR which uses scalar energy.
Norberto Keppe and other scientist are raving about this technology and yet again I don’t know exactly what the big deal is.
Can this Scalar Energy and Keppe Motor work as an alternative to fossil fuel?
What is Scalar energy really?
And how does this Keppe Motor work that is different from any other ordinary electro-magnetic motor?
Brian, if you’re out there man I’d like some answers and would appreciate help.
Thanks
joez
January 25th, 2012
Use the waste heat from a gasoline or diesel engine to reheat the expanding compressed air. This could be a workable hybrid car
Mike Biddell
January 29th, 2012
It’s a gormless idea. Frictionless flywheels would work nicely.
Sully
February 4th, 2012
I think the “Air Car” is a great idea NOW, and for the future, I would like to explore the idea even to include an on-board air compressor that could be run off the alternator to give continuous air pressure to the onboard tanks, which would allow the car a continuous running time, thus eliminating any need for compressing stations.
Vultures’ the continuing corruption of a governmental system that gives the “Petroleum Pigs” the rights to rape the peoples land; as they continue to expunge a un-restorable natural recourse, in which the commonwealth of this country will be secretly taxed in paying to clean-up after them and still we will continue to deal with the never ending and ever more deadlier environmental disasters with no end in sight.
Brian Paul Wiegand
February 13th, 2012
Dear Irshaad:
One of the really great early conmen, Roy J. Meyers, had a similar “invention”: the energy “absorber”. The stated idea was to obtain free energy by tapping into all the naturally occurring electromagnetic fields existing in space, and in particular around the earth. Such energy does exist, but it is very diffuse and in order to get sufficient amounts to be of any use the recieving antenna system would have to be immense, on a planetary scale or larger. Roy, however, was very clever; one wonders what he would have been able to legitimately achieve if he had not aspired to be a crook. What he did was erect his energy “absorber” antenna near radio broadcasting stations; the miniscule amounts of “free” power he was able to intercept he presented as “proof” of the concept’s correctness.
It’s unfortunate that the goals of acquiring inexpensive energy and preserving the environment have been, and continue to be, obscured by legions of crooks attempting to take advantage of the better nature of people, but that is the case. Legitimate advances in energy production, transportation, and many other areas are often damaged or delayed by all the confusion and distrust created by the scam artists and criminals, even without the counter-productive efforts of politicians and special interests.
Jim
February 22nd, 2012
Why does every alternative energy vehicle have to look like something out of Dr Suess? This is why they dont sell. I’m sick of people blaming it on the technology and the consumers.
bob
March 5th, 2012
Hey all this is too technical for me but i think the cars on the road now could be retrofitted to have compressed air entering cylinders at given times by redoing the computer.when the pistonwas depressed a relief valve would open into pipe that would recirculate that air back into cylinders requiring less air.an air compressor could be installed in the the car & powered by wind generators behind grill(why not use the air coming at the car once it’s moving)tanks could be placed under car where unneeded exhaust system use to be.let’s all drive up to the dmv & pass the emissions test easily.
Sherry
March 8th, 2012
its not the technology that stinks. It the oil companies and the government. In the 70s, I had a great uncle that invented a battery powered car. It made the cover of popular mechanics. You wouldn’t believe how the oil companies literally drove him into the ground. He was unable to go forward with his plan commercially. A few family members did benefit though. Haha oil companies!!! They have all the power in is world!
Mike
July 7th, 2012
What about “The Magnetic Air Car, inc” (http://magneticaircars.com/). I can’t find anything on this later than 2008 or 2009. They said they’d have a prototype by 2010, but it doesn’t look like anything has happened. Did this technology fail? Does anyone know anything about this company and tech. as of late?
MaxB
August 14th, 2012
Amusingl, I visualize Dad driving the car and Mum and the kids frantically manning pumps to keep the air tank pressurized as they travel together down the road rather than spend good money recharging the tank at a service station. That should save a few rupees.
The battery could be charged by spraying the car body with light sensitive polymer paint which converts sunlight into electricity. developed by Australia’s CSIRO Scientist Gerry Wilson.
Luis
August 22nd, 2012
Dear Beth Buczynski,
Have you read or heard any further updates on the air-compressed car? I would be very interested in learning more and purchasing one once it’s available in the USA. Thanks so much! Sincerely, Luis Aponte, author of “Death of a Gas Guzzler”
bob
August 29th, 2012
has this car been accepted or been passed by the crash tests required for cars in the usa? its glued together.
MaxB
August 29th, 2012
From what I have seen of it on TV the car is intended to be manufactured in India and will only sold to Indians.
So saying, it will be required to comply with the Indian standard of specifications.
Once neighboring countries see it in action my bet is it will go into production in other countries using their standards and specifications.
The Big Oil cartel can bleat all they like but will get short shrift if they try to dictate to third world countries.
Marvin Shebby
September 29th, 2012
My right foot is not being very fuel efficient