When gasoline cars were made, there was little concern about our atmosphere. There was also plenty of fossil fuel to go around, too.

Gasoline cars are fairly self-explanatory, the intake valve lets gas in the chamber, then the piston compresses the gas and a spark plug ignites the gas and an explosion happens pushing the piston down and forcing the motor to turn and power all of the gears turning the wheels.

However, today’s gas prices are soaring, and fossil fuels are becoming rarer and harder to find. Sooner of later, the earth will be run dry of fossil fuels. What will happen to our future cars? If there is no fuel for our cars to run on, how will we get around?

There are 3 types of cars that will help us out when fossil fuels become too expensive, too rare, or nonexistent.

Solar powered cars run off of solar power. They have solar panels that charge the cars batteries. The cars may have about 4-10 batteries to store and use energy. The batteries then use the energy to move the car.

The newest type of car is the hybrid. The hybrid has two motors, an electrical (for lower speeds/city driving) and a gas/combustion engine (for higher speeds). The electrical motoris charged when the brakes are depressed. So, every time you stop at a light or stop sign the friction from braking transfers energy to a battery that runs the electrical motor.

Some companies though are creating hydrogen cars. They are cars that will run on the most abundant element in the universe, hydrogen. The motors will combine hydrogen and oxygen and the resulting heat will power the motor and create the most abundant element on earth, water.

Hydrogen stores energy better than batteries, and burns twice as good as gasoline. Right now the amount of hydrogen needed for a hydrogen economy is about five times what we are producing today. Most of the hydrogen we are producing today is extracted form fossil fuels. So someone needs to find a way to produce more hydrogen cheaply

Still the hydrogen cars must be able to run at least 400 miles before refueling and the only way for companies to do that is to harness hydrogen in its gas form, but to do that they would have to compress the gas into the fuel cell and the fuel cells will then have to be reinforced to hold the pressure.

Hydrogen cars are still about ten years away for the civilian population, but all three of these alternate energy cars will not be about speed, but efficiency. But since this day and age in our generation is all about speed and power, it will seem as if we are going back in time to slower cars, but these cars will be more efficient.

Sooner or later the solar powered, hybrid and hydrogen cars will replace gasoline cars forever. When the future comes around and fossil fuels are gone these will be our main types of transportations, slower, more efficient and expensive.