Compressed Air Vehicle, miniCAT — Coming to India in 2012

December 17th, 2011 by Zachary Shahan

Over on sister site Planetsave, Michale Ricciardi just took a bit of a closer look at the miniCAT, a compressed air vehicle coming to India in 2012. I’m no car expert, so let me know if we’re missing something here, but this looks pretty promising:

The ‘MiniCAT’ – The Car of the Future or A Lot of (Compressed) Air? [VIDEO] (via Planetsave)

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Tags: CAT, compressed air vehicle, miniCAT, quickies, Tata

About the Author

Zachary Shahan spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as the director/chief editor. Otherwise, he's probably enthusiastically fulfilling his duties as the director/editor of Solar Love, EV Obsession, Planetsave, or Bikocity. Zach is recognized globally as a solar energy, electric car, and wind energy expert. If you would like him to speak at a related conference or event, connect with him via social media. You can connect with Zach on any popular social networking site you like. Links to all of his main social media profiles are on ZacharyShahan.com.

Mary M

When will they come to the USA?
lvildos

a bit strange having an exhaust below zero degrees. That would mean you can build the pressure up again just by exposing the air to ambient temperature in most places and have a perpetual motion machine
Aircars Tk

Hi, the article above is unfortunately based on outdated information. Tata has indeed bought the right to use the MDI-air engine technology in India only, early 2007. However up to now they still show no sign in actually commercializing this. The only air car that is allegedly ready for market is the tiny Airpod, which has been developed by the Luxemburg based company MDI in its factory at the French riviera. This car is samller than a Smart car, seats three, has no steering wheel but a joystick and has no doors. The driver enters through the windshield and the passengers through the rear window. It has a 260 liter air tank and the air is compressed at 248 bar, comparable to natural gas tanks. Please go to http://www.aircars.tk to find all information, photos, videos, links and always the latest news
- http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
  
  Thanks.
Anonymous

The biggest issue with these air cars is that nobody has actually had a chance to test their range claims. 300km on a tank sounds great, but the only actual test of an air car got a range more like 3km.
Compressed air has relatively low energy density. Air at 30 MPa (4,500 psi) contains about 50 Wh of energy per liter. The Nissan Leaf uses about 21.25KWh/100KM, so it would use 63KWh for 300Km. If the air car got twice the efficiency that would be 32.5KWh/300Km, or 650 liters of compressed air. To hold 650 liters at 4500 PSI would be a big heavy tank.
I think if they are lucky, they might get 30 Km on a fill.
- Anonymous
  
  First, let me say that I’m somewhat skeptical of these cars appearing.
  
  That said, let’s look at a couple of things. The MiniCAT weighs about half what the Leaf weighs.
  
  650 liters is about 23 cu.ft. The Leaf has a 12 cu.ft. trunk. It might be possible to squeeze that much tank space into the Tata.
  
  The air tanks aren’t heavy, they’re made of carbon fiber rather than steel. (And designed to rip if punctured. That lets the air escape over a large area rather than ‘explode’.)
  
  On the web I’m seeing 340 liters (but who knows?).
  
  If the MiniCAT gets only 150km/90 miles per fill it would still be a very useful second car for many households or a good first car for many in developing countries. Remember, a <5 minute rapid fill.
  
  Think of all the working folks who have a modest daily commute and a limited budget. This car avoids expensive EV batteries.
  
  $8,200 financed at 4% for 5 years would mean a $151 monthly payment. You can't buy a used car and put gas into it for that small a monthly cost.
Jlmur

I saw a display or booth at a green gathering years ago and I asked them about the noise that it seemed to emit. they said they needed to tune the mufflerl It doesn’t sound like they did much to help. I hope they did.
zenith

It’s good to see that Tata have finally made good on their commitment to bring this car to market.

I will get one when it arrives.
muchos huevos

We need this car in the USA, I ndia can wait!!! they already have Tata motors providing a similar vehicle.
riyad

if this car is being introduced to the Indian roads, why is the steering wheel on the left side ?
- Anonymous
  
  I think the pictures are all from pre-Tata models.
  
  It’s going to be very interesting to see if these cars actually appear or if someone has just scraped stuff together to make it seem so….
  - Jlmurtaugh50
    
    I think they are really loud. Do you know anything?
Len Levine

Filling up the tank at home may not be inconvenient, even if it takes 3-4 hours, but how long will the driver have to wait to fill the tank up on the road?
- Anonymous
  
  “(note: refueling will mean a few minutes of compressed air pumping at stations with specially designed air compressors, and will cost about 100 rupees, or about 45 cents, for another 300 km of range).”
  
  Air is pretty easy to “pipe”. Filling from a reservoir of compressed air should be fast.
Anonymous

I think this car is a long question in France. You have a lot of companies that have paid for building this car and no one could …
The compressed air is not a fuel. Until you have tried this car you cannot understand. You will have a big surprise. If you go more and more quick you have a big problem. 60 mph is a maximum for how much time? I don’t know.
Until now no journalist have tried to drive this car, never over the world.
My doubt is very enormous when I look at the past …
- Anonymous
  
  As far as I can tell the previous companies that tried were small companies with limited resources.
  
  Tata is a major corporation. If they are bringing this car to market (which I’m not absolutely sure is happening) then they must have figured it out.
  
  Gasoline and diesel are energy storage systems, just like batteries and compressed air. Over millions and millions of years solar energy was stored as fossil fuel.
  
  Slow acceleration? Perhaps. But many gas powered cars are low powered and don’t zip off the line.
  - Anonymous
    
    We will see next !!
    I have seen what our frenchie have made before …
    A lot of people who have lost a lot of money …
    Good luck!
    Paul
Anonymous

I’ve been in a lot of compressed air car discussions over the last few years and the ‘anti-‘ folks declare that it will cost too much to compress the air. But I read this…

“range of 185 miles (300 km) before needing to “refuel” (note: refueling will mean a few minutes of compressed air pumping at stations with specially designed air compressors, and will cost about 100 rupees, or about 45 cents,”

I suspect someone got the math turned around. 100 Indian rupees should be about $1.89. That’s about $0.01 per mile. The Nissan Leaf, charging on $0.08/kWh costs about $0.028 per mile.

MiniCAT 750kg (1653 pounds). Nissan Leaf 1521 kg (3354 lb). Clearly there’s less mass to move so it’s going to take less power.

I’m having trouble finding an average power cost for India. It seems like electricity is sold to some sectors, especially residential, at a loss. Industrial and commercial users apparently pay more than cost of generation. The price per mile might be low largely due to very low cost power to compress.

The big winner here is the initial purchase price. By avoiding (hopefully-temporarily) expensive batteries they can bring a vehicle to market for a very nice price.

Wonder what it would take to make this car pass US safety standards? Could it be done and keep decent range and price? Might it be possible to create a US model for folks who need cheap transportation?

I sure would like to see a more objective number for the energy needed to move this little puppy a mile. Working through rupees/cents per mile is pretty sloppy.

—————–

Safety.

It does have a tubular frame. It has seat belts and at least one air bag.

And it’s not likely to flip you out when a front wheel meets a pothole or railroad track.

I’d say that it’s much safer than a motorcycle.