Ford's hemp car closer - a greener choice that produces less smoke
Yes, yes... A car made from hemp? It's a subject we have discussed a few times: hemp-powered cars and car panels made from hemp fiber, and it looks serious: Ford, teaming with the UK's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and hemp fiber supplier Hemcore are developing a plant matter used to build auto bodies. The DEFRA is investing half a million pounds (roughly a million dollars) in the matter, because the resulting material can be useful in not using petrochemicals and metals to build cars and is biodegradable. The manufacturing process itself is claimed to save energy (that's what I meant with less smoke).
Hemp fibers (grown from specific varieties, not all hemp is the same) have been traditionally used to make baskets, shoe soles and even paper and physical properties make them potentially suitable for lots of duties.
There was a prototype in 1941 with a plastic body made up from plant material. Our colleagues at Autoblog wonder how much hemp can raise the price if this comes to a successful end, thinking about the effects of E85 had on the market, the so-debated tortilla
Related: [Source: Autoblog]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
PT Dante 9:05AM (6/30/2008)
Ya.. Well. When you make a car strong enough to last a while, car companies are out of business. No wonder they killed the idea.
As for comment no. 1.
Hemp is actually far from a mediocre crop. It Yields more paper, more biomass and absorbs carbon dioxide five times more efficiently than the same acreage of forest.
And not to mention, it's one of the strongest fibres known to man.
I'm keeping my post short, before i write 3 pages of information on this.
Read Free Amsterdam. http://www.freeamsterdam.nl
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Mike Z 6:36PM (7/20/2007)
Overall hemp is mostly a mediocre crop in terms of producing fiberious materials.
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Some Dipshit 6:48PM (7/20/2007)
This is nothing new... Check out Up In Smoke with Cheech and Chong!!
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Domenick 8:19PM (7/20/2007)
It's great to see industry using the wonderful qualities of hemp fiber in modern products. It's sad that American politicians won't allow farmers to grow it here. The Canadian certainly is doing quite well.
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