MERCEDES are aiming to end the need for filling your fuel tank with petrol or diesel within just SEVEN YEARS.

The German firm are determined to make their model range run on alternative fuels - to improve costs, become more eco-friendly and because the oil supply will eventually run out.

The fuel-ture is bright ... Mercedes

There are 50million jobs worldwide associated with the car and more than 80 per cent of goods are transported by road.

Mercedes are convinced that these two crucial areas of industry can be saved by making vehicles independent of crude oil - to improve costs, become more eco-friendly and because the oil supply will eventually run out.

The company have already spent £2million on their new long-term Sustainable Mobility plan and are set to invest a further £7billion before 2014.

This includes making current engines even cleaner and more fuel-efficient while increasing the amount of hybrids, emission-free electric cars and clean-fuel gas engines and the further development of battery and hydrogen-powered vehicles.

Mercedes will drip-feed different forms of more eco-friendly vehicles into our showrooms as and when the technology has been developed over the next decade - but the process begins towards the end of this year.

The new A and B-Class models which go on sale in October feature Start/Stop technology - the car’s engine shuts down when it’s stopped at a red light but automatically restarts when you lift your foot from the brake pedal.

Around town it can improve fuel efficiency by up to nine per cent.

Also out later this year are the Blue Efficiency A-Class 160 and C-Class models, which could reduce fuel consumption by a further 12 per cent.

Mercedes have also just announced that the Smart diesel will come to the UK for the first time in February 2009.

The new Smart Cdi will be the cleanest production car in the UK - emitting just 88g per kilometre of CO2.

Modern ... new generation of Merc

The company’s next big step will be to launch a Smart electric car which is fuel and emission-free.

There are currently 100 Smart electric cars being given trials in London and they could be on the market as soon as 2010.

At the same time Mercedes hope to have their remarkable Diesotto engine available for their range.

Launched at the Frankfurt Motor Show last year, it will produce remarkable performance, yet will slash fuel consumption and emissions.

I was the first UK journalist to drive the Diesotto engine and ride in the sensational F700 concept - see below - in Seville last week.

Also on the horizon are zero-emission fuel cell cars - such as the F600 Hygenius which I also drove.

They use electricity and hydrogen for power and are set to go into a prototype B-Class in the coming months, slashing current fuel costs and eliminating emissions completely.

Professor Dr Herbert Kohler, responsible for Mercedes’ advanced engineering, told me he believes that by 2015 motorists will have switched almost completely to alternative fuel cars, certainly in cities, to eliminate the need for petrol and diesel in urban areas.

That’s great news.

Not so far in the future we will be charging our cars at night, not getting charged a fortune.

ROAD TEST: Mercedes F700 Concept

BEAM me up, Scotty!

The Mercedes luxury car of the future has lasers, a 3D cinema, a reversible backward-facing seat and a stunning computer-generated girl called Gloria - it really is a modern-day Starship Enterprise.

Concept ... sensational F700

I’m the first UK journalist to get my hands on the sensational £1million F700 which represents the premium car we will be wanting to drive halfway through the next decade.

I got a behind-closed-doors sneak preview of the Mercedes test site in Seville and it was like being invited by Q into the secret, hi-tech world of 007.

So I donned a special scientist jacket and glasses to fit in better – although I ended up looking more like an Elvis Costello tribute act.

The F700 is an S-Class that has been to the gym. It’s leaner, meaner and more macho, with muscles appearing from every wheel arch.

But this concept’s beauty is in its brains, not bigger bulges. It is nicknamed the Flying Carpet because of a gadget they call Pre-Scan Suspension.

That involves lasers housed in the headlamps scanning the road up to ten metres ahead so the suspension can prepare even earlier for speed humps or potholes to keep a superbly smooth drive.

There are even lasers in the wing mirrors to check for obstacles when opening the doors.

Inside, the F700 is like a bachelor pad. There’s a unique giro-chair which reverses in five sections so that the front passenger can face backwards towards the 51cm 3D plasma screen with cinema surround sound.

There’s even what Mercedes have called a sushi bar console in the back, and legroom is so good even Peter Crouch could stretch out.

For the driver there is a control system called Human Machine Interface.

The driving dials are on a mirrored screen perfectly placed in your driving eye line to reduce eye movement from the road to the dials and therefore lessen tiredness on long journeys.

But my favourite innovation is that KITT from Knight Rider has gone from being a camp Englishman to a stunning blonde German called Gloria!

Computer-generated Gloria appears on a screen, greets you and chats away as you ask her for satnav directions, to call a contact on your phone or to change the radio station. Now that’s what I call progress.

But the genius in the F700 is under the bonnet. The Diesotto engine makes its debut in this car and offers incredible performance for what would normally be a gas-guzzler.

It combines the low emissions of a petrol engine with a diesel’s fuel economy and is the first time diesel technology has been used in a petrol engine.

Classic

To gain the classic performance in an S-Class, the smallest engine currently offered is a 3.5litre V6 petrol.

The Diesotto is just a four-cylinder 1.8litre engine yet still delivers 238bhp with 0-62mph in 7.5 seconds and a top speed of 155mph.

That means it produces the performance of a BMW 730d Sport yet with fuel economy better than a Suzuki Swift 1.3litre petrol with 44mpg and fewer emissions than a 1litre Vauxhall Corsa petrol with 127g per kilometre.

I drove this new engine fitted in a current S-Class and it was smooth and hardly any different from driving a huge V6 in handling or delivery of power. It also has Start/Stop technology to boost economy even further.

Because the Diesotto engine is just a four-cylinder, it is relatively small and can fit into the entire range of premium Mercedes cars once it has been fully developed, by 2011.

And because of its size, there is more interior room available for the cars which use it - the F700 illustrates just how well that extra space can be used.

Mercedes concepts are rarely just wacky motor show headline grabbers. The Germans always use the technology which goes into future models within five years so this is certainly the S-Class of the next decade.

But I can’t wait until then. I’m missing Gloria already.