Powering Your Car With Wood And Gas

We like to think of hybrid fuels as something that has been an innovation of the present generation in response to the environmental problems caused by gas-guzzling vehicles and their unenlightened drivers. However, as history shows, there is evidence that we may not be the trailblazers we like to congratulate ourselves for being. Before the idea of a greenhouse effect was common currency, before anyone even knew what a carbon footprint was or had even heard of it, alternative fuels have been used to power motor vehicles.

No where is this more evident than in the case of the wood gasifier, a wonderful invention which saw the light of day during World War Two – yes, as far back as that – as a solution to the scarcity of affordable oil resulting from the war. An engine was developed that used readily available resources, in this case wood, and the idea caught on in many European and Asian countries. Fast forward more than sixty years and we where patting ourselves on the back for taking baby steps towards an efficient electric car!

The principle of getting gas from wood was explored even earlier than that, but the greater efficiency of other methods meant that it took a back seat to other ways of powering a vehicle. But when the war effort demanded that fuel supplies were diverted from the commercial and domestic users, the idea was reborn. Using readily available wood to power an internal combustion engine was something that people had already considered, and as a result of necessity the wood gasifier became commonly used.

Wood gasifiers had been implemented for use in heating, where their suitability for a stationary design was exploited to the maximum and their clean burning style was of obvious benefit, but it was necessity and not environmental concerns that drove their adaptation in practice to power motor vehicles. Then again, it is said that necessity is the mother of invention. The technology as it was used back then has been somewhat abandoned by the automotive industry – being considered somewhat too unwieldy for the needs and preferences of drivers – but some innovators are even today looking at how to turn this old idea into a way to help save the planet.

Australians Hans and Anton Hochwald have developed a modern wood gasifier that has enabled them to drive the 900 kilometers between Mildura and Canberra in two days. Though they report some technical problems with the running of the wood gas-powered vehicle, the fact of what they achieved shows what is possible, and represents an impressive updating of existing technology in a way that could be beneficial to our pockets and our planet.

Certainly there are drawbacks to wood gasifiers – not least that they produce some carbon monoxide in the gasifying process, although this is converted to carbon dioxide – but as a demonstration of what is possible when you take an alternative approach to a problem, the wood gasifier is something from which all of us can learn.