Category: Green Tech
It has been said that we know only 5 percent of what we will know by the year 2050, and that includes the many ways we could be transporting humans and goods. Let’s look at some of the popular predictions of how transportation may change over the next 30 years. (More after the jump)
Among a variety of safety and fuel efficient features, the Cruze uses a unique oil pump that allows the engine to work less and ultimately save fuel. The variable displacement oil pump reduces the amount of energy needed to pump the oil in the vehicle without taking anything away from the engine.
This feature is standard in the Cruze Ecotech 1.4L turbocharged engine, and helps the Cruze Eco achieve segment-leading 40 mpg on the highway.
We’ve got a ways to go until solar powered vehicles are a common sight. Not only are most of them rather dull, quirky, and slow (60 mph top speed), solar film technology is not quite as far along as some would have hoped it would be by 2010. Quite frankly, the most an automotive manufacture could expect to power a vehicle on a cloudy day with a small photo-voltaic sheet, is a cigarette lighter.
But technology continues to push forward, and Peter Wilkins, an automotive design student at Swansea Metropolitan University (UK), has built a model of a solar powered vehicle, which at the very least takes care of the typical humdrum look we’ve grown accustomed to. In theory, it should perform fairly decently too, considering it comes with a mid-mounted hydrogen fuel stack powering four independent electric motors. The fuel cell will get its juice from the sun, through an arsenal of photo-voltaic cells placed across the hood, rear vents, and trunk area.
The body has been streamlined with carbon fiber in the image of the Volkswagen Scirocco, minimizing wind resistance and increase cooling and down force. This solar powered Volkswagen would be considered somewhat of a luxury item, according to Wilkins, limited to only 200 units per year. The soonest we’d expect to see something like this on the streets would be somewhere between 2015 and 2020, so start saving now. This type of technology will not come cheap!
(Photos and Story via Top Speed)
It wasn’t all that long ago amphibious cars looked a little like this 1966 Amphicar (pictured below). Basically a motor boat with wheels. They really were neither too spectacular on the road, nor too maneuverable on the sea.
When traffic is bogged down to a standstill, there is typically one thought that crosses everyone’s mind. If only I could just drive over top these other cars. Well, some Chinese scholar had the same idea, except instead of just dreaming, it has now become a source of plans to improve the bus systems on China’s overcrowded highways.
The bus will be appropriately called the 3D Express Coach, hinting at its ability to literally straddle the highway and drive right through heavy traffic jams. On less traffic hindered days, the vehicles (those under 14 feet high, anyway) will be able to drive underneath the buses, which will travel at speeds around 40 mph.
