Future Car Engines
Future engines in cars will be unlike anything we have today.
Don't get me wrong, the internal combustion engine has served
its purpose well since being developed in the 1800's. Some say
the car engine of the future is already here and it's a battery
electric car based on electric motors and some form of lithium
battery.
But, this is short-sighted. The internal combustion engine is
not done yet, especially with plug-in hybrids rolling out that
have far more range than battery electric vehicles and which also
don't have to have a charge in order to run.
In the near future car alternative car engines will start to
pop up all over the place. One example is the MYT Engine which
won awards from NASA for its engineering prowess. The MYT engine
is an internal combustion engine that can run on my different
kinds of fuels and is 1/10 the size of a big rig diesel engine.
I predict in the not so distance future that more iterations
of the MYT Engine (call it MYT 2.0) will come forward and flourish
in the marketplace. Pneumatic engines have been in the research
labs for a while. These too will come of age.
Right now we have some hydrogen fuel cell vehicles being leased.
Hydrogen, methanol and other kinds of fuel cells will begin to
expand in the marketplace for future cars. Currently we also have
air cars such as from Tata, flex fuel vehicle from several of
the Big 6 automakers, compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles such
as a car offered by Honda.
Future car engines will serve to expand upon this technology.
But this is only the tip of the iceberg. In the next 10 years,
solar cars will come of age for short distance travel, adding
to the choices of battery electric vehicles as commuter cars to
and from work.
For the next 20 - 30 years more iterations of future plug-in
hybrids will continue to have a stronghold on the marketplace
as the combination of plug-in batteries (powered by renewable
resources such as wind and sun) coupled with fuel cell or some
other future engine will become the norm.
Plasma Engine |
But, beyond 30 years, here's another set
of predictions. Another leap in transformative, disruptive
technology will take place. Future car engines that run
on fuels such as hydrogen peroxide will come of age. Other
fuels only legal at racetracks such a nitrous will also
be used and street legal.
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Ammonia which has been used in some cars currently as a cheap
alternative will finally make it to the marketplace. But, these
will not be game changers.
What kinds of engines then will be in future cars? Some people
say that nuclear fission or cold fusion will come of age. But,
I beg to disagree. As we discussed this (Okay, I wrote this and
you're reading it) NASA is working on plasma engines to propel
future rocket ships to Mars.
Within the next 30 years these hot plasma engines will be perfected
for space travel, downsized, commercialized and used in future
cars. Radio waves and electromagnetic fields will be used to create
future plasma propulsion thruster engines in cars.
Since safety is always paramount when talking about automobiles,
this will be the largest factor in commercializing this type of
future engine for cars. If you think this is science fiction,
think again. Everything I've just told you is emerging technology
that is being worked on right now.
I hope we are both around to see this kind of radical automotive
technology come to fruition.
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