Photos: Sexy Green Car Show 2008

Lotus Exige 270E Tri-Fuel
If you're lucky, you may have sneaked a peak before at this conversion of the classic Exige. This is a real working sports car with a green twist. It looks identical to the normal Exige but with one key difference: you put different fuel into the tank. This model can use petrol, ethanol and -- most unusual of all -- methanol. Now methanol's not readily available anywhere yet, but it does have interesting potential as an alternative fuel. If carbon capture coal power stations ever take off, you could take that CO2, add it to hydrogen and make methanol in a carbon-neutral process, theoretically at least.

Interestingly, using the biofuels makes this Lotus perform better -- you get 19 per cent more power than using petrol. You can't buy this Tri-Fuel edition but it is a real, working car -- the Lotus guys drove it up from Norfolk yesterday. If it ever does make it to market, expect it to sell for around the price of the normal Exige. That's a cool £34,000.