Dutch Prime Minister driven by bio-methanol

Thursday, 14 August 2008 20:16

After filling up the unique Lotus Exige 270E Tri-Fuel with our bio-methanol, Dutch Prime Minister Balkenende and Minister of Transportation Eurlings, gladly took the opportunity to take the car for a spin around “Het Binnenhof” – the Dutch Houses of Parliament. The Lotus Exige was brought to The Netherlands to make its appearance at the ING Race Salon and Bavaria City Racing in Rotterdam. Because support from the government is crucial for the introduction of 'green' methanol, Mr. Balkenende and Mr. Eurlings were given the opportunity to drive the Lotus before it drove on to Rotterdam - they happily interrupted the budget talks for this.

Lotus Engineering introduced the Exige Tri-Fuel sports car - capable of running on any mixture of gasoline, ethanol and methanol – at the Geneva Motorshow earlier this year. It is a perfect way to demonstrate that internal combustion engines - running on renewable fuels - have an excellent performance. In fact, this is the most powerful version of the Exige so far. For now, there are no plans to take the Tri-Fuel into commercial production. Instead, the goal is to encourage other car manufacturers to profit from Lotus' research and adopt the same engineering in order to make the necessary transition to using more environmentally friendly fuels.

(photo courtesy of Hans Hordijk)

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