Compressed air motors exist, and can be used to drive a car without electric power at all. I have actually ridden in a compressed air powered car
One of those, quite possibly that actual vehicle.
It works, but it isn’t a fantastic solution, and electric is better.
Batteries and electric motors have a higher end-to-end efficiency than compressed air.
Compressed air motors get very cold in operation; thisMotor For Air Conditional Manufacturers makes air conditioning trivial, but leads to problems avoiding the motor from freezing, and means you have no obvious way of heating the cabin.
Compressed air motors are incredibly noisy and hard to silence.
The air tanks are hard to manufacture, and very heavy; batteries are probably lighter for the same stored energy. The air tanks are also very physically large, so the green taxi only had tank capacity for about 100 km of driving… not because the tank was too expensive or too heavy, but because there was nowhere toChina motor for air conditional manufacturers put a larger tank (it was installed sideways under the front seats).
The only real advantage is that you can refill the air bottles in a few seconds.
