Air-Powered Car, AirPod: The Future Of Urban Transportation? (VIDEO)

There are cars that run on gas, electricity, vegetable oil, even human waste, and now there is a car that runs on air.

The AirPod has been created in the UK and runs on compressed air. This CNN video demonstrates how the three-wheeled, two door, steering wheel-free vehicle zips around. (It is also oddly reminiscent of a car from "The Jetsons," but that was probably not planned.)

Compared to a standard car, the AirPod emits a fraction of the pollution, can reach up to 50 mph, and will cost around $10,000. Motor Development International hopes that the AirPod will be the future of urban transportation.

WATCH this car run on air:

Comments

[Kenz300]

04:42 PM on 02/19/2011

The price of oil keeps going up.

Better look to alternatives. Electric, hybrid, flex-fuel, CNG are all
going to be part of the mix.

[UnderTheHedgeWeGo]

08:52 AM on 02/12/2011

How FAR will it go? That would seem to me to be the limiting factor of something running on compressed air.

[SisterAnn]

08:21 AM on 02/12/2011

Couldl they have made it any uglier?

[hannabanana]

12:00 PM on 01/15/2011

Something that moves you around relying on air for fuel.

Man, isn't WALKING a marvelous invention?

[eric14]

04:33 PM on 01/13/2011

The future of urban transportation is for all to make around half the journeys currently undertaken.
Common sense, working at home, saving money, the economy and video/internet will take care of most reductions.

[morgansher]

01:04 AM on 01/11/2011

That is a charming little vehicle and I'd love a chance to take one out for a drive.

[sf omega man]

02:41 AM on 01/08/2011

The future of urban transportation will be bicycles and rail.

Come to think of it, that was the past too.

[MichaelRCooke]

10:58 PM on 01/04/2011

3 wheel atv's are proven to be unstable and dangerous, I don't see how this 3 wheel design is inherently more stable.

For such a car to become popular in America, it needs power and an aesthetic closer to that of a 'muscle' car.

[morgansher]

01:12 AM on 01/11/2011

The stability thing is a concern and I'd feel better about 4 wheels however much I'd like to try an Airpod now. I rode in some 3 wheel cars while stationed in the UK, and they don't have the same road feel as a 4 wheeler either. However, if they come out with a good 4 wheel version, I'd be well pleased.

I don't think we American's "need" a powerful, muscle car-- that's a created need that some have been taught and conditioned to want through a lifetime's worth of advertising pushed on 'em. Big, fancy, powerful vehicles really aren't what some of us really want.

[SisterAnn]

08:23 AM on 02/12/2011

How about training wheels for those who don't feel safe on 3 wheels? I would buy them.

We would need a lane for the smaller energy saving cars because the big cars would hurt us.

[sculptor]

01:23 AM on 12/31/2010

This not a new idea. The best take on the idea was a pnenumatic hybrid that used the engine to compress air when braking which it later used to bring the car back up to speed. This improved milage about 15% and was a simple and cheap addition to a conventional engine.

[sushai]

06:33 PM on 12/29/2010

Next in line, a car that runs on a rubber band and propeller.

[scottyknows]

02:46 PM on 12/28/2010

I'm no mechanic (I only play one on PuffPost) but how would one fill up?

[ObjectiveRealist]

09:29 PM on 12/28/2010

Where do you conservatards normally get all your hot air?

[MichaelRCooke]

10:56 PM on 01/04/2011

There isn't a gas station in existence that hasn't a powerful air pump to fill a flat tire.

[Raccoon1]

11:16 AM on 12/28/2010

"Orville, Wilbur, that darned flying contraptio­n of yours will never work. It only holds one passenger and flies only a hundred yards."

Orville Wright lived to see a man walk on the moon.

[Joe Goforth]

11:12 PM on 12/27/2010

Hey, What happen to my last two posts! Your guys are working for GM aren't you!

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

07:57 AM on 01/08/2011

GM could design a compressed air car if they thought there was a real market for it. This thing isn't any threat to GM. ICE cars just work too well.
And it really isn't a threat to the oil companies either. After all the compressor has to be powered by something.

[Joe Goforth]

10:08 PM on 12/27/2010

I like it

[wbthacker]

01:30 PM on 12/27/2010

The car uses compressed air as 'battery", so the key question is, how do you compress the air?

Currently, storing energy through compressed air is about 50% efficient. To get X amount of energy out of a compressed air tank you have to spend 2X to compress the air (and deal with the adiabatic heating and cooling you get when air pressure changes).

So even if you start with clean electricity from a solar cell, you lose half the power by storing it as compressed air.. Also, with compressed air you can store about 100,000 joules per kilogram that your storage system weighs. (You wan the storage system to be light, because your car has to carry it.)

The lithium-ion batteries that are the current vogue for electric cars, on the other hand, are 80-90% efficient and can store six times as much energy for the same weight. So an electric car with the same power and range as the compressed-air car will weigh a lot less (so it uses less energy to move) and will take less electricity to recharge.

This prototype air-car works only because it's so tiny. I think that if you scaled it up to match, say, a Chevy Volt, it would prove impractical.

Summary: a good experiment and it may be influential, but you won't see these driving around town.

[jeremyv1980]

10:06 PM on 12/27/2010

Ford done it with hydraulic accumulators charged with nitrogen. Very efficient. They only used it for regenerative braking and accelerating but it cut fuel consumption dramatically for city use, and the regeneration cycle was roughly 80% efficient. Hydraulic transmision methods have always been pretty high efficiency by design. Ford used this system on UPS trucks, F350 tonkas and now they are going to move forward to F-150's. It is a hybrid, not a power source but it could be used as a battery as well if made large enough.

[Joe Goforth]

11:17 PM on 12/27/2010

The dark side knows how to compress air Luke