[Duke Nukum]

Mister Fusion!

It solves all the problems, especially of having to seperate stuff out to recycle.

[3niner]

I expect that alternative methods, for powering automobiles, will be developed and improved over the next few decades, but the gasoline engine will not stand still and wait for the others to catch up.

Our gasoline engines have improved greatly since the sixties. Most of this improvement has been in reducing pollution and increasing power output, but engines have also become more efficient during this time.

However, gasoline engines still supply less than 1/3 of the energy, obtained by burning gasoline, to the output shaft. This is primarily due to two factors, thermal inefficiency (much of the energy is discarded as waste heat), and mechanical inefficiency (the linkages that transfer energy from piston movement to a rotating shaft, are not optimal).

In the last few years, breakthroughs have been made in both of these areas. There is still a lot of development that must take place before these can make a lot of difference, but I expect that both will be greatly improved.

The mechanical (bottom end) breakthrough is already in limited production. The thermal breakthrough needs a lot more work before it can become practical.

[free_life]

An air burning vehicle. Hot air expansion with low spark ignition.

[kaktuskid]

Still, hybrid and diesel are oil products.

Herr Diesel’s original engine ran on linseed oil.

Diesels can burn any vegetable oil