Environmentalists the world round have just received a powerful new weapon - the air-powered car. The car in question, the CityCAT, designed by Indian auto-giant Tata motors should hit the Indian market in August 2008 at a price of just $12,700. The specs of this vehicle are a green wet dream and an auto-enthusiast’s nightmare: it takes just two dollars of electricity to fill up the tank with compressed air, and this gives the car a range of 125 miles and a top speed of 68 mph¹.

Of course, this technology is in its infancy, and does not promise to save the world just yet. For example, the car will have to get above 68 mph if its ever going to fully replace our dirty cars. It’s always possible that there are engineering limits on the car that will result in a dud. But far more scary is the prospect that corporate America will identify this car as a threat and destroy it, in the style of the electric car. The CityCAT is already barred from America, although not Germany or Israel, for the excessive use of glue in its construction.² The car is still relatively unknown and this would be an easy enough feat for GM or Ford (why are these companies so bent on destroying the world when they are all losing market share to relatively enlightened Toyota or Honda? Ask the electric car. Or maybe the executives at Exxon Mobil). In order to prevent this, the word must be spread. If people know about the air car, it will be much harder to bury. We need this car, so let’s pay attention.

1. World’s First Air-Powered Car: Zero Emissions by Next Summer, Popular Mechanics, June 2007. ↩
2. World’s First Air-Powered Car: Zero Emissions by Next Summer, Popular Mechanics, June 2007. ↩