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GREEN IS GOOD. BROWN IS FOR COFFEE HEADS - INTRODUCTING THE CARPUCCINO:

2010-03-08

The 1988 Volkswagen Scirocco will be driven from Manchester to London powered only by roasted coffee granules.

Meet the VW Carpuccino. It runs on coffee but won't be restricted to the filter lane or take the grind out of commuting.

It also won't save you any cash because, at around 30 times the cost of running a car on petrol, the invention won't please the motor industry's bean-counters.

It's been nicknamed the Carpuccino and was created from a 1988 Volkswagen Scirocco bought for the equivalent about R4800 and chosen for its resemblance to the time-travelling DeLorean in the movie "Back to the Future".

It's to be driven the 330km from London to Manchester powered only by roasted coffee beans and was built by a team from the BBC1 science programme.

"Bang Goes The Theory"

The Carpuccino will do five kilometres to a kilo of ground coffee.... It's scheduled to go on display at the "Big Bang" science fair in Manchester to show how fuels other than conventional petrol and diesel can power vehicles.

The team calculates that the Carpuccino will do five kilometres to a kilo of ground coffee - the equivalent of about 56 espressos per mile.

The journey will use about 70kg of ground coffee which, at British supermarket prices of between £13 and £26 a kilo depending on brand and quality, will cost between £910 and £1820 (about R11 000 and R22 000) or between 25 and 50 times the cost of petrol for the journey.

In total, the trip will use the equivalent of 11 760 espressos and the team will have to take a coffee break roughly every 30 to 45 miles to pour in more granules ... but will have to stop every 100km to clean its filters to rid them of the soot and tar generated by the process.