Gas is not really needed.....

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Well, not really. But it can be seriously challenged now. Of course it wont work for everything right now (diesel 18 wheelers delivering goods, ships, etc) but it is doable for a lot of daily driving...60% of drivers drive less than 50km a day, and 80% of those 60%, never leave urban areas. This is for them.


http://www.theaircar.com/
Watch it drive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmqpGZv0YT4


The biggest drawbacks that I hear are the styling and not standing much of a chance if hit by an SUV for example. But shouldnt this type of car be given some serious consideration?

Discuss.
 
Sure!!!!! Test it. Try real-world practicality.

"...zero pollution in cities and considerably reduced pollution outside urban areas."

Writers should quit insulting reader's intelligence. What will be the source of the compressed air? Takes energy to compress it. There will be some form of pollution somewhere.

Hey, herd. Remember the recent uproar about the wonders of hydrogen fuel cells. Many jumped on that bandwagon, especially politician of whom the vast majority are woefully ignorant of matters "scientific."

I suppose that, perhaps, the word about pollution arising somewhere in the chain of creating hydrogen finally reached the brain-dead droids.

Haven't heard a peep about hydrogen fuel cells for a long time.

Curious how the herd musters for the latest craze then drops it after awhile. Betcha' most of you are not part of that herd I write of. Most. Maybe almost all, but I detect herdiness hereabouts from time-to-time.

BUT WE SHALL ENLIGHTEN YE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep.
 
I work in one of those climate change facilities that produces the electricity required to compress that air in the first place.

Compressed air cars are another bad idea.

...unless you use things like wave power, wind power etc to directly compress the air...then there's the reticulation system.
 
"...then there's the reticulation system."

Hmmmmmm...... as used by numerous pythons?
 
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Writers should quit insulting reader's intelligence. What will be the source of the compressed air? Takes energy to compress it. There will be some form of pollution somewhere.




Just a thought: solar panels can be used to generate the electricity for an air compressor.

I do believe the writers are making their reduced pollution claims about the car itself. Of course zero pollution is impossible in this world.
 
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Compressed air cars are another bad idea.

...unless you use things like wave power, wind power etc to directly compress the air...then there's the reticulation system.




Bad idea? Care to say why?

Reticulation system? There will be no piping of compressed air. Not sure I understand wheat you are trying to say....
 
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Sure!!!!! Test it. Try real-world practicality.




They will be on the roads in 2008. Then we will be able to see how they do.

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Hey, herd. Remember the recent uproar about the wonders of hydrogen fuel cells. Many jumped on that bandwagon, especially politician of whom the vast majority are woefully ignorant of matters "scientific."




Are you really comparing the cost and infrastructure needed to support hydrogen to the cost and infrastructure to support compressed air?
 
Compressed air, has several advantages over hydrogen.

-Compressed air is easier to contain. Hydrogen is so small that just by leaving a hydrogen tank sit it looses hydrogen.

-There is already infrastructure in place for creating massive amounts of compressed air (check your local home center for air compressors)

-Compressed air is not a fire hazard, only a rapid depressurization hazard (this can be mitigated by using carbon fiber tanks like firemen do)

-Air turbine technology, closely related to steam turbine technology, is a practice over 50 years old. It is simple to achieve with low tech materials. This would mean that developing countries, and rapidly growing countries like China and India, could easily implement a less polluting means of personal transportation than an internal combustion engine automobile.

Hydrogen is only being used as an energy storage medium. Compressed air, batteries or wound up rubber bands can do the same. What about the byproducts of creating a hydrogen car in the first place? All of the heavy metals that need to go in to the fuel cell. All of the new materials that need to go into the hydrogen production units.....
 
I am not trying to say that we should all give up our Mopars and go air...Im saying that if we can find a way to supplement gas engines we can reduce pollution. Is that not a step in the right direction?
 
The air-driven cars could have their roofs covered with photovoltaic cells which could, weather permitting, drive a small compressor to fill a spare compressed-air tank. The cars could also be fitted with small "windmills", incorporated into body "scoops" for example, which could be connected to dynamos which also could provide electricity for that purpose - and no wind is necessary for this, just driving along would activate these "windmills". Homes and buildings could likewise have their roofs covered with photovoltaic panels to provide the electricity needed for compressing air.

Furthermore, the engines of the air-driven cars have so few parts in them that there is little wear and tear - another important economy there.

Whether the answer is the compressed air car or something else, the fundamental issue is to wean ourselves from fossil fuels.
 
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The cars could also be fitted with small "windmills", incorporated into body "scoops" for example, which could be connected to dynamos which also could provide electricity for that purpose - and no wind is necessary for this, just driving along would activate these "windmills".




There you've just explained your lack of understanding of the laws of energy and mass. You are trying to create a perpetual motion machine.

I'm against hydrogen as a storage medium for many of the points that you've already (validly) mentioned, plus others.

My point was that if we use existing energy infrastructure, the pollution problem becomes worse.

We generate electricity at 35% efficiency, consuming coal and water. Transform/transmit it at 90%. Compress it at 75%. Expand it at 75%...17 percent (if you are lucky) of the energy in the coal.

Solar panels ?

Let's say your car is 2 metres wide, 4 metres long, and 1.5 high. A box, with surface area 28m2. Lets say half the sides face square on to the sun (impossible), and lets say the sun is providing 6KWhr/m2/day ( insolation figures for Oz ).Then assume 20% solar cell efficiency, 75% compressor efficiency.

The stored energy will be 45MJ, almost exactly the same as a single litre of petrol. Albeit that you can use it at twice the efficiency of that litre of petrol.

My point with reticulation is that if we decide that we are not going to use existing coal/nuke infrastructure, and building a new coal power station to fuel the "Compressed Air Economy" then we will be reliant upon some other means of getting compressed air, probably some sort of renewable.

Wave and Wind are ideal for providing directly compressed air, rather than conversion to electricity, transmission, distribution, compression etc. Then you need reticulation.

As to using air powered turbines...turbines are exactly the wrong power source for extracting tractive effort out of expanding air.
 
You could have air compressors attatched to the wheels that would offer a refill on braking applications similar to the way a hybrid has regenerative braking. That might sound pretty cool too! It'd be like having a little mini "Jake Brake" when you were slowing down!
 
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There you've just explained your lack of understanding of the laws of energy and mass. You are trying to create a perpetual motion machine.

I'm against hydrogen as a storage medium for many of the points that you've already (validly) mentioned, plus others.

My point was that if we use existing energy infrastructure, the pollution problem becomes worse.

We generate electricity at 35% efficiency, consuming coal and water. Transform/transmit it at 90%. Compress it at 75%. Expand it at 75%...17 percent (if you are lucky) of the energy in the coal.




I did not mean to imply perpetual motion, just a supplement. If the energy was made by dynamos, there would be no need to transfer the energy across many miles, most likely just many feet. I dont see how that could be worse than what we already have.

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My point with reticulation is that if we decide that we are not going to use existing coal/nuke infrastructure, and building a new coal power station to fuel the "Compressed Air Economy" then we will be reliant upon some other means of getting compressed air, probably some sort of renewable.

Wave and Wind are ideal for providing directly compressed air, rather than conversion to electricity, transmission, distribution, compression etc. Then you need reticulation.

As to using air powered turbines...turbines are exactly the wrong power source for extracting tractive effort out of expanding air.




Our political system will not allow a replacement of gas with air....I am suggesting a way to decrease oil consumption. Air powered forklifts in wearhouses for example. That would cut back on the amount of toxic batteries getting dumped into our lands...
 
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I did not mean to imply perpetual motion, just a supplement. If the energy was made by dynamos,




You simply CANNOT use the forward motion of the vehicle to generate charge (except in a regeneration mode like the Prius).

It will take more energy to drive the car than you get back from the dynamos.

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Our political system will not allow a replacement of gas with air....I am suggesting a way to decrease oil consumption. Air powered forklifts in wearhouses for example. That would cut back on the amount of toxic batteries getting dumped into our lands...




At a huge increase in emissions from coal fired power stations etc.

If toxic batteries are being dumped into landfill, that that's another issue, not related to gas, oil, or compressed air...they should be recycled. Pure and Simple.
 
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You simply CANNOT use the forward motion of the vehicle to generate charge (except in a regeneration mode like the Prius)...




Wind flows around/over/through (certain portions) cars, how could you not get a charge? Wind power does produce electricity. Seems like you are saying wind power can generate no charge....
 
Denmark generates over 20% of its electricity with wind turbines, the highest percentage of any country and is fifth in the world in total power generation (which can be compared with the fact that Denmark is 56th on the general electricity consumption list).
 
you cant generate power via windmills on a car because the increased drag will consume more power resulting in zero energy gain if the system was 100% efficent, and negative gain in reality because nothing is even close to 100% efficent. its a catch 22.
there is NO way around this. if there was, everyone would already be doing it on cars, boats, trains, espically airplanes! man can you imagine a propellor connected to another propellor on a plane and no engine? it would be sweet but its not possible.
 
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Denmark generates over 20% of its electricity with wind turbines, the highest percentage of any country and is fifth in the world in total power generation (which can be compared with the fact that Denmark is 56th on the general electricity consumption list).




Wind is such a low grade energy source, and the U.S. uses so much electricity that the bulk of all of your electricity has to come from coal/nukes.

Look a this much vaunted Australian wind farm.
http://www.bcse.org.au/docs/Project Profiles/Blayney Wind Farm.pdf

Peak production is 9.9MW, which is about the same as one boiler feed pump in a traditional power station. Those that I work at produce 2400MW (any time of the day or night), with an auxilliary energy consumption (that energy required to drive the pumps and fans) of nearly 10 times that of the local wind farm.

Wind doesn't blow all day every day, while factories and humans do. The morning and evening peaks occur every day, whether the wind is blowing or not.

Finally, these smaller machines tend to be asynchronous, and therefore need the majority of the generators connected to the grid to be large utilities, operating synchronous.

Don't get me wrong, if there is a good wind site, or a dam releasing water, the energy should be captured and used.

But to suggest replacing oil with either compressed air or hydrogen will require vastly more coal to be burned than the oil it saves.
 
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