Paddy Lowe’s fossil-free fuel costs $12,000 a gallon
The first commercially-available e-fuel has gone on sale, and, while it might help save the planet, it costs the earth.
Zero Petroleum, the British firm started by F1 engineer Paddy Lowe, is offering the very first barrel of its fossil-free gasoline to eight early adopters at the price of £50,000 ($60,310) for a 20-liter (5.2 gallon) can. The “1st Barrel” collector’s edition Jerrycan is full of the company’s 95 octane gas, comes with a certificate of authenticity, and will be signed by Lowe.
The 100 percent synthetic fuel is created by mixing hydrogen, generated by water from electrolysis, with carbon dioxide captured from the atmosphere. The process, which Zero calls petrosynthesis, is powered by electricity generated by solar or wind, making it completely carbon neutral.
Zero says that the fuel is “drop in” and can be used in any vehicle and has the advantage of matching the same energy density as regular gas. It is also free of contaminants such as sulphur, so burns cleaner than today’s pump fuels. The company’s technology allows it to produce gas, diesel and kerosene for aviation without requiring additional refining.
It’s essentially the same idea that Porsche has adopted and begun to produce at new factory in Chile, where it aims to produce 145.3 million gallons of e-fuel annually by 2027. Porsche has partnered with Highly Innovative Fuels on the plant and plans further facilities in Australia and the U.S.A. At this scale the price should come down considerably, we hope.
Although it is in some obvious need of development, this is a much more practical alternative to EVs. If we throw a fraction of tax dollars and propaganda at this that we are throwing at the EV… I bet it’ll work
Ugh. Paddy lowe. I’m not supporting anything that man promotes after his disastrous turn at Williams got him booted.
The idea would be very useful if we had the unlimited power that could be provided by developing fusion energy. This is the only way to move forward from the current energy supply. The idea that we could use EV is nonsense, we do not have enough raw materials on the planet to make EV’s for the US much less the whole world. The modern internal combustion engine is the most efficient power source we have, if we could make clean fuels like this it would make them even cleaner. The EV solution is a fraud, EV’s are not clean, not efficient, and should be called displaced emission vehicles, not zero emission vehicles.