In order to be efficient and powerful, a steam engine needs high-pressure steam, which can only be safely contained by thick, heavy boilers and pipes. This makes miniaturization of steam engines for cars difficult. Gasification of wood allows you to keep the benefits of the internal combustion engine.

You can run a gasifier out of almost any biomass, coffee grounds, wood, leaves, corn husks. Then with minor modification you can run most cars on the resulting syngas.

I wonder if you could power a turbine with wood.