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Automotive: discover the Hemp Cars of 2022

It sounds incredible, but the countless potential of the Hemp Cars that Henry Ford showed to the world in 1941, have remained almost ignored for all the decades to come. Recently, however, there has been a reversal of the trend …

HENRY FORD E LA HEMP BODY CAR

If you are a lover of this plant, perhaps it will not surprise you to know that back in 1937, the American entrepreneur Henry Ford created a prototype of a car, the Hemp Body Car, capable of revolutionizing the automotive market as much then as now. The car was first presented to the general public at a festival in Michigan in 1941.

It was so called because the bodywork was entirely made with a material in bioplastic largely obtained from hemp and from soybeans, which turned out a lot lighter of normal metal bodies, but also remarkably more resistantso that on the net there is still a vintage video of Ford violently hitting the car body with a hammer, without scratching it in the slightest.

But this was not the only reason why the hemp machine was revolutionary: to move it used a chard made from hempa type of fuel that is still estimated to be among the most valid and convenient, both from the point of view of environmental sustainability and from the point of view of cost.

PRODUCTION COSTS AND NEW SOLUTIONS

In 2010, Canada Motive released the Kestrel, an electric car model whose bodywork was made from a polymer resin obtained from hemp stalks. It was equipped with a very light body, strong like fiberglass, but with a greater shock absorption. It was potentially a ‘very versatile carsuitable both for the city and for short trips outside the city, too bad it is not May stata marketed.

At least one of the possible reasons why certain projects did not arrive on the market could be related to the fact that in the recent past the cost of hemp fiber increased due to having to transporting hemp plants collected at a plant where there was a dehuller and then at the production plant. But now they are there trucks equipped with dehuller which go directly to the hemp fields, significantly reducing production costs.

TODAY’S INCENTIVE IN HEMP CARS

Today Hemp Cars are finally starting to be commercialized, as there is more pressure on the automotive industry to use sustainable materials and reduce its overall carbon footprint. And certainly one of the ways to make the industry more sustainable is to use plant-based products and among these hemp is a significant source of fibers and produces versatile and highly performing materials, while helping to reduce the ecological footprint.

Launched in 2013, the i3 was the first electric car from the BMW with another feature that makes it out of the ordinary: its bodywork is made of a hemp-based composite material, similar to that developed by Ford in the previous century.

Today, too Audi, Mercedes, Chrysler, Volkswagen and Porsche they are making cars with hemp bodies in which bioplastic made from hemp results extremely resistant and its life cycle highly sustainable.

NBA STAR LAUNCHES ON THE HEMP CARS MARKET

Is it finally time for Hemp Cars? Isiah Thomas seems to believe strongly, one of the 50 greatest players in the history of the NBA, is now an established and highly regarded businessman and international investor, as well as CEO of the One World Productsthe largest producer of hemp-based materials and extracts in Colombia, a country that is focusing heavily on this crop.

Today the NBA star’s company is also working on hemp car components. Under a recent agreement with Stellantis, the sixth largest carmaker in the world, owner of Chrysler, Citroën, Dodge, Fiat, Jeep, Peugeot and other brands in its portfolio, One World Products will develop and supply hemp-based bioplastic components for car interiors and exteriors.

In a recent interview with Forbes Thomas declared his will to reduce the carbon footprint of cars replacing the traditional plastic components with those in bioplastic derived from hemp and made no secret of the desire to transform One World Products into the largest supplier of this material in the world.

AUTOMOTIVE AND TRUE GREEN REVOLUTION

That hemp is a revolution for a growing number of sectors, not least the automotive sector, we at Sweet life we do not find it hard to believe it, but perhaps it will be useful to remark it by directly quoting the creator of the first Hemp Body Car, Henry Ford: Why consume forests that have taken centuries to grow and mines that have taken entire geological ages to settle, if we can get the equivalent of forests and minerals from the annual growth of hemp fields? “



TG DV

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