The physicist may not be sufficiently familiar with the problems of very high pressure air. (I've worked a bit with 4500psi air)

Transfer rate of very high pressure air from storage to an empty tank has to be slow because the sudden pressure buildup in the empty tank/lines causes heating. In the presence of combustible material (entrained oil from the compressor) this can cause "dieseling" in the piping which would destroy it. It's also really, really LOUD.

Commercial air compressors are generally not of really high pressure. A compressor capable of very high pressure requires a large motor and thus home air compression wouldn't be "free."

Storage of really high pressure air requires good tanks and piping. I'm sure that there would be certification and OSHA issues that go with.

It's unclear to me whether the energy storage capacity is adequate to serve real needs. Let's see them start out on golf carts and fork lifts before requiring me to buy one....

Newspaper articles often are methods of gaining funding for projects rather than actually informing of breakthroughs in technology.

I'm still waiting for the flywheel-powered buses and the flying cars that Popular Science wrote up when I was a young teen.....
The Moeller Air Car has been a recurring theme for 30 years. But I still don't have one in my garage.