The compressed air vehicle (the air car) was originally invented by Guy Negre: A Formula One race car engineer. For over 10 years this concept was perfected by their company: MDI, and now, with over 40 patents, the technology is being licenced for world-wide production. Tata Motors (india’s largest vehicle producer) caused a huge stir when they said they would begin producing it in India in 2009. Now Zero pollution Motors (ZPM) has gotten the rights to begin producing them here in the USA and will begin to open assembly plants (which will also be dealerships) and start selling vehicles starting in early 2010.

Zero Pollution Motors (ZPM) confirmed to PopularMechanics that it will begin producing the world’s first air-powered car designed for the United States by late 2009 or early 2010. ZPM has attained the rights for he USA from the Luxembourg-based MDI (which developed the Air Car engine). They will begin to build the first of several modular assembly plants, which are said to begin manufacturing in the Northeast and grow accross the country to put out up to 10,000 Air Cars per year.

ZPM is licensed to build MDI’s two-seater OneCAT economy model (the one for India) and three-seat MiniCAT (like a SmartCar for 2 pasengers) but without fuel. The New Paltz, N.Y., startup wants to make the air-powered cars for sale at a low $17,800 starting point for a six-seat modified version of MDI’s CityCAT (pictured above) with an even more advanced engine that is said to travel as far as 1000 miles at up to 96 mph with each air fill-up.

The reason they believe the can achieve this range is due to their new dual-energy engine. After using compressed air fed from the same Airbus-built tanks, the new design has a supplemental energy source to increase the speed by 35 mph. ZPM says that a newly designed system heats the air in a way that officials refused to elaborate upon, though they insisted it would increase the air volume and thus the car’s range and speed to be able to reach the 1000 mile range.

They explain that these are just estimates, and that they’ll know soon more precisely when engineers begin testing. ZPM spokesman Kevin Haydon told PM, “a vehicle with one tank of air and, say, 8 gal. of either conventional petrol, ethanol or biofuel could hit between 800 and 1000 miles.” On a side note, this seems to me (the author) that they’ll be using a small fuel-powered air compressor on board to reach this amazing 1000 mile range.

The company is doing standard safety tests in Europe, then side-impact tests once it arrives in the States. After that, it could be the first 100-mpg, nonelectric car you can actually buy - and all for less than $18,000!

You can visit the ZPM website at: ZeroPollutionMotors.US