Audi is getting rather serious about carbon neutral synthetic fuels nowadays and to prove how much they believe in this technology, they put the Audi A3 g-tron on sale in Germany priced at €25,900 ($35,407).
The car is powered by a 110 horsepower 1.4-liter TFSI engine and can run on both gasoline, compressed natural gas or the e-gas generated at the world's first industrial power-to-gas plant built by Audi in Werlte, Lower Saxony.
A3 g-tron customers can obtain an Audi e-gas fuel card for a flat price of 14.95 euros per month. In addition, the costs for the quantities of gas refueled by each customer are deducted. On average the Audi A3 g-tron consumes between 3.2 and 3.3 kilograms of gas per 100 kilometers. Fuel costs at present start at around 3.50 euros ($4.7) per 100 kilometers (62 miles).
Audi e-gas can be purchased at over 650 fuel stations in Germany and the buying principle corresponds to how green electricity is distributed: Audi records the quantities of gas that the customer pays for using their Audi e-gas fuel card and ensures that exactly this amount of Audi e-gas is fed into the German natural gas network.
If they keep at it, we'll reach a point where Audi becomes a player in the energy sector as well as the builder of things that consume a lot of it...