Dutch designer Gijs Schalkx has retrofitted an old car to run on an unusual fuel source: waste plastic that is turned back into oil.
Schalkx's DIY project, titled The Plastic Car (Is Made of Metal), consists of an old red Volvo with a roof-mounted "de-refinery" that heats plastic to obtain oil for the fuel tank.
The project began as a follow-up to the Sloot Motor motorcycle that Schalkx made as part of his product design course at the ArtEZ University of the Arts, which runs on methane harvested from local bogs.
The Plastic Car (Is Made of Metal) runs on plastic waste
Schalkx, who is interested in DIY as a form of responsible design and living, wanted to build a car with a similarly original energy source and chose plastic because there was a ready supply to be found in his own household recycling. He sourced an old car from a scrapyard in Germany, fixed it up to be road-legal and fitted his "de-refinery", which he says is quite similar to a "normal oil refinery", to the top.
Plastic is loaded into this reactor and burned in an oxygen-free environment to make it evaporate into gas. When the gas condenses again, it is in the form of oil, which then drips down through a tube into a fuel tank in the back of the car, ready for use.
The rooftop "de-refinery" burns plastic to convert it back into oil
Schalkx used only his own household recycling to power the car, which he drove for around half a year while making a video of the work, needin...