Barack Obama's audacity of hope is already starting to take shape. It seems that people around the world are indeed listening to Obama and are ready to take action based on his sound ideas.

A new car that runs on compressed air has been researched and developed in Nice, France by the inventor of this technology, Mr. Guy Negre founder and CEO of MDI SA, a company headquartered in Luxembourg.

While we in America are bickering about whether to drop our dependence on foreign oil and the security risks that it continues to pose for us, automakers elsewhere around the world are starting to act. Do you want us to continue to be consumers of other people's products? Have we lost our ingenuity or the spirit of invention? For God's sake, we made the Model-T: old man Ford must be turning in his grave at where we've taken his car industry.

An Indian car manufacturer has already bought the rights to make the Compressed Air Vehicle (CAV) for the huge Indian market. The car reaches top speeds of 35 miles per hour for 60 miles on only a tank of compressed air so in the Indian market, consumers can commute to and from work and complete daily chores.

On highways, the CAV can cruise along at speeds for nearly 800 miles on a small motor that compresses outside air to keep the fuel tank filled. It also runs fuel efficiently on gasoline, diesel, bio-diesel, ethanol or vegetable oil.

It is reported that the CAV can average 106 mpg more than double the Toyota Prius, even if it uses regular gasoline. However, its main focus of environmentally friendly vehicle means that the air tank can be refiled when not in use by simply plugging into an electrical socket to recharge as the motor compresses air via electricity.

The CAV has old-fashioned car engine pistons so it's taking off-the-shelf technology with an added twist of combustion air instead of gasoline or diesel fuel. Therefore, in a place like Michigan the old technology could be re-applied in the same manufacturing plants and re-hire hundreds of laid-off car plant workers.

This is no longer the audacity of hope but the audacity of immediate action and could be step one in our long process back as a force to reckon with in the world of car manufacturers.