Daily Auto News Long May You Run to the Store on Electricity Alone, says Neil Young
Daily Auto News
We’ve known for some time that rock legend Neil Young had enlisted the help of an uber-mechanic to build himself an electric car worthy of a musical icon – a battery-powered 1959 Lincoln Continental Mk IV Convertible. Two-point-five tons of Detroit steel, not a drop of gas – an audacious thought. But what Neil was actually planning is a bit more impressive.
A fleet of them.
The San Francisco Gateway explains, “The rock legend has created a company called Linc Volt Technology to promote the conversion of existing gas-guzzling cars into vehicles that run on alternative energy.” Linc Volt’s “first goal is to win the $10 million Automotive X Prize being offered by Progressive Insurance. To do so, they have to build a clean, production-capable vehicle that exceeds the alternative fuel equivalent of 100 miles per gallon of gas.” To that end, they’re using technology that can “run strictly on electricity using a rotary engine and its batteries” for short drives, and “For longer hauls, there’s also a generator in the car that runs on compressed natural gas. When electricity runs short, the generator kicks in and refuels the batteries.”
After the X Prize competition, the company plans to perform conversions on customer-provided vehicles. Details beyond that are sketchy, but the company’s website says, “We will know we have succeeded when one or more major companies are building automobiles that use our technology or something similar, creating 0 emissions, while saving money for the owner.”
Autoblog Green notes, “Marc Benioff, a friend of Young’s, is set to be the newly-created company’s first customer, getting his Ford F-150 truck converted to electric.”
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