Air Car – Myth or Masterpiece?

It is not uncommon to hear a complaint from someone who has had their pay cut, or is unable to work their usual hours and as a result will have less money in the bank, complain and ask “What do they expect me to live on? Thin air?” This rhetorical question is a stab at the ridiculous assumption that people can possibly get by on nothing more than the air that they breathe. The fact of the matter, however, is that there are certain people involved in trying to develop a car that does exactly that. Well, OK, not exactly that, but one that runs on air nonetheless. If this was to work and be genuinely applicable, it could revolutionise the way we drive forever. So, does it work, and is it genuinely applicable?

The man behind the idea is a Frenchman named Guy Nègre, from a company by the name of Motor Development International based in Luxembourg. His belief and his hope is that the use of compressed air will be able to drive a motor engine effectively enough to power cars around city centres and along highways. The technology, if it turns out to be effective, will revolutionise motoring for the driver by cutting fuel bills – filling one’s tank will cost the equivalent of $2 and the car will, Nègre claims, and then have a range of 125 miles. This may not be as much distance as you can get with a full tank of petrol, but it is a fraction of the price – so why not? It sounds like a fine idea.

The problem is that the technology which would be used to drive the car is considered by experts to be entirely unworkable. Monsieur Nègre has been touting the qualities of the air car for some time, and was suggesting that the first Air Cars were imminent as far back as 2002. It would not be entirely fair to say that he is peddling a myth that can never be workable, as science has made fools of us all in the past. But given the continuing delays in actually putting a working model in front of us, the least that can be said is that he lacks credibility. Certainly, it is possible to make a car move with the use of compressed air, in much the same way as it would be possible to make a car move by harnessing the energy of a coal fire – but containing this in a car engine has so far proved impossible.

There are many competing technologies out there which will, hopefully, one day deliver to us the truly green, truly efficient car that will allow us all to use our cars as and when we need them without needing to worry about environmental impact. At present, though, the technology is short of where it needs to be in order to dispense entirely with non-renewable fuels. Although Guy Nègre may mean well, his plans are some way short too.