This news comes as something of a game changer for the Nano. Before the car offered bare bones transportation at a cheap price. Certainly a strong selling point, but with skyrocketing fuel prices, the gas has become as much a barrier to market entry as the price of the car. With the incredibly cheap fueling cost on compressed air the car becomes even more accessible to an even wider audience.

Forget all that for a moment though. This kind of makes us wonder what the point is of billions of dollars being invested in lithium-ion batteries, hybridization, low rolling resistance tires, aerodynamics, hydrogen fuel cells and all that other malarkey. The issue with all of the highly touted alternative fuels is capacity or distribution. Hydrogen fuel is expensive to make, has no distribution network and it would be expensive to implement one. Electricity generally comes from coal-fired power plants at the moment (in the US), charging stations don't exactly litter the landscape, and even it they did, it takes forever to charge the batteries.

However, the air compressor engine can rely on almost any power source. All it has to do is be converted by way of air compressor. You could use a gasoline compressor, windmill, a water wheel, electric compressor, hell, you could pedal your way to a full tank if you rigged up a proper system. And cheap. Air compressors have been around for a couple hundred years now. We kind of have them figured out. And they work fast, a fill up would probably take as long as it does now. Huh, remind us again why we're supposed to be excited about alternative fuels? [NYTimes]

The car — which we'll keep calling it as it currently lacks a name — is capable of traveling upwards of 125 miles on three dollars worth of compressed air thanks to mostly air- and fuel-driven motor and brake power recovery system. Prices are very reasonable as well with the first fleet being estimated at only $7,000 each. The very conceptual-looking design pictured here is nothing to drop your trousers about, though. [a href="http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/01/air_car_is_here.php">Treehugger]

The perpetual-motion machine may be eons away, but the the first commercially viable car to run on compressed air may be at hand. The brainchild of French inventor Guy N gre, the MDI, which we first reported on in 2005, employs a novel system of compressed air tanks and an internal-combustion support engine that can either power the minicar or compress the air used in its tanks. The urban runabouts, which come in a number of configurations, are built from fiberglass over a tubular chassis. MDI plans to offer them with a host of information systems that interface with the car's inner workings and provide connectivity to the internet and other systems as well as digi entertainment. A new partnership with India's Tata motors — the country's largest carmaker — may mean MDIs could show up en masse soon. Maybe even this very decade. – Mike Spinelli

The Air Car - zero pollution and very low running costs [Gizmag]

Related:
More on the MDI Air-Powered Car [internal]

Ladies and gentlemen, I bring to you two related topics bundled together via the horrors of YouTube. First, in this Beyond Tomorrow segment is MDI's compressed-air car we wrote about back in the dark ages of blogging (2004). Still the same couple of years off as it was then, it remains a fascinating concept with quite a bit of the development work done. Still, it probably needs a bit more cashola to get production going. If the first part of the vid is neat-o, the second part is gee-wiz. It features a funny Italian engineer who is developing an engine that appears to be powered by air and possibly magic. It makes Mazda's Renesis engine look both overly complicated and gigantic. The power to weight ratio is reportedly outstanding. Of course, if the complete engine only weighs a handful of kilos, that's not real tough. Now if you check out the MDI site you'll see they have their own nifty engine hoo-hahs, but I say if you combine these two ideas, you get some actual air-powered magicalness.– Ben Wojdyla

Related:
More on the MDI Air-Powered Car [internal]