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Air-fuelled car is on the way

MUMBAI: Tata Motors, India's largest automobile company, is all set to bring the 'clean' car technology home. Guy Negre, a French inventor, started to work—in the south of France, a region better known for luxury villas—on an engine that would run on, well, thin air.

Now, Tata Motors, India’s largest automobile company, is enamoured by his research and has joined hands with Negre’s family-owned company, Moteur Developpement International (MDI), in an attempt to bring this 'clean' technology home.

The air-powered engine is modelled on the conventional internal combustion engine. However, instead of fossil fuels like petrol or diesel combining with air and generating energy, this engine will produce momentum by releasing compressed air.

Said an automobile expert, "Although a car that generates momentum from compressed air is an interesting concept, the critical question is how efficiently and conveniently can you store the power generated?"

Negre believes he has found a way out by compressing air into fibre tanks which in turn, expands to push the pistons and create movement. Because there is no combustion, there will be no pollution. Equally important, the oil that lubricates the engine will need to be changed only once every 31,000 miles. Of course, there are concerns on how the idea will scale up. But those concerns are for another day.

The agreement between Tata Motors and MDI includes financial support from Tata for further development of the technology. A Tata Motors’ spokesperson said, "The refinement of the engine and the technology require a couple of years of more work. So, we can expect such cars on the road only after that."

MDI has created prototypes of four vehicles powered by this engine. These include a car, a taxi that can ferry five passengers, a pick-up truck and a van. However, Tata Motors is interested only in the engine.

The air engine is an emission-free piston engine using compressed air. The engines are similar to steam engines as they use the expansion of externally supplied pressurised gas to perform work against a piston. A successful vehicle would offer many of the advantages of a battery electric vehicle with the additional ability to quickly restore the stored energy - in a few minutes rather than the hours required to recharge batteries.

A similar concept is currently being developed by the Uruguayan engineer Armando Regusci, an Australian Angelo Di Pietro and a South Korea Chul-Seung Cho. Despite interest in the technology, no company has yet put a vehicle using this technology into mass production.

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