Singer Neil Young is reinventing himself as an eco-friendly pioneer - by developing a car that runs on electricity.

The 62-year-old has teamed up with mechanic Jonathan Goodwin from Wichita, Kansas to turn his 1959 Lincoln Continental to a battery car - spending $120,000 on the project. And he wants to create a whole line of electric cars.

He tells the Wichita Eagle newspaper, "Jonathan and this car are going to make history. We're going to change the world; we're going to create a car that will allow us to stop giving our wealth to other countries for petroleum."

Young turned to technology after realising his music wouldn't change the world for the better.

He says, "You know, I thought long ago you could change the world by writing songs. Oh, you can inspire a few people, get some of them to change their thinking about something, but you can't change the world by writing songs. But we could change it with this car."

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