This week's prestigious "Gadget of the Week" goes to: Saab's biofuel/electricity powered hybrid model introduced at the British International Motor Show this week.

What we like:

• Being from Sweden Saab is clearly profiting from the Swedish government 's initiative to become the world's first oil free energy country within only 5 years. Government -tax- incentives are required/important since bio fuel filling stations need to be also built up country wide.
• Can run on any mixture between ordinary petrol and E85, a fuel blend that contains 85% bioethanol made from plants.
• In the future the Power Hybrid will become available, a concept car that combines a plant-powered engine with an electric one, thus reducing emissions even further.

What we don't like (yet):

• As with many gadget's also this one is -still- expensive at least the Hybrid one will be.
• Announcements of when the Power Hybrid model will be available have been unclear.
• The fact that Saab belongs to GM might have been a blessing for them so far but now it seems more of a burden and source for uncertainty due to GM's troubles.
• The design-sorry guys- could have a bit more sex appeal. It looks a bit boring like most of the GM family cars.

Unlike its US counterparts in this list it seems to be used primarily for non-military and non-security research. The computer is not for everyone, as the following numbers show:

• 38 million EUR CAPEX, 15 million EUR OPEX for the 6 years of its operation
• 20 monitors survey the building area in a separate control room
• the cube building to house the computer measures 36mx36m
• aircooling requires 400'000 m3 air per hour