Sustainable Motorsport Round-Up for April 2, 2022-Sustainable Racing On Two Wheels and Four

This week in the Sustainable Motorsport Round-Up I bring you developments from MotoE, Formula E, electric rallying, video of some cool electric karts, sustainable motorsport tech developments, and my semi-regular feature on getting to the track sustainably. All this plus how you can register for the upcoming Green Racing Virtual Summit and more.

Series News

• Green Racing News has the details on the new race weekend format that will be followed by MotoE this year. “The Grand Prix weekends are structured as follows: Fridays will feature two free practice sessions along with qualifying, while Saturdays and Sundays will feature a race, i.e. the events will now be two-race events.”

• The 2022 British Touring Car Championship’s pre-season program got underway at Donington Park in Leicestershire, UK, on March 29, with the venue hosting the first of three hybrid installation tests ahead of its season opener on April 23/24. The test marked the first official outing of the TOCA Hybrid system in 2022, a spec unit developed by Cosworth, which sees the UK’s premier national series become the first major touring car championship in the world to integrate hybrid power, after systems were distributed to all BTCC teams in recent weeks.

• The Opel Corsa-e Rally will enter its second season of competition in 2022, with the car and its dedicated one make series, the e-Rally Cup, both coming in for updates. New additions to the car include a revised limited slip differential, while the external sound system has been optimized as part of the overall safety concept, making the car easier to hear and enhancing its acoustic appeal for spectators. “With the ADAC Opel e-Rally Cup, the long-standing partners ADAC and Opel have created a milestone in international motorsport”, said Opel Motorsport director Jörg Schrott. “We have proved that electric rallying works and is exciting. The Cup will be even better this season, thanks to the highly attractive calendar and the fine-tuning of the technology.”

• Formula E has officially revealed its list of manufacturers for the Gen3 era. Seven manufacturers have been accepted by the FIA. These are DS Automobiles, Jaguar, Mahindra, Maserati, Nissan, NIO 333 and Porsche AG. According to the article in The Race, “The FIA and Formula E have been approached by several other manufacturers in recent months about the possibility of entering as manufacturers for the second homologation period which will be in the summer of 2024 for FE’s 11th and 12th seasons in 2024/25 and 2025/26 respectively. One of these is known to be Lucid Motors, the California based specialist EV automotive and technology company.”

• Ellis Spiezia, an EV race car driver for Ellysium Racing who says “Electric is the future, for performance and the planet,” takes us behind the scenes with Play and Drive’s all electric kart racers in the video above.

• Females in Motorsport has a great feature on Formula E Senior Sustainability Manager Iona Neilson. “As a Senior Sustainability Manager, Iona leads on the environmental excellence pillar of Formula E’s sustainability strategy with a focus on monitoring, measuring and reducing the environmental impacts of the championship. One of the main focuses of the role is operational delivery, which involves working with a number of different internal departments on a race by race basis to ensure the event is planned and delivered with sustainability in mind.”

Sustainable Motorsport Technology Developments

• Green Racing News looks in detail at the Hydrogen-powered Forze IX chassis, this time focusing on the monocoque. “The chassis monocoque is a carbon fiber shell that protects the rider, as well as carrying several components, such as the shell, a rigid, resistant and lightweight part. In the case of the Forze IX, the design resembles that of a Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) vehicle, manufactured and designed in collaboration with ADESS.”

• One of the debates in Formula E circles is whether battery development should be opened up. NIO 333 technical chief Duncan Laycock feels that doing so would create “a bigger void” between manufacturers and would be difficult to level commercially.

• This is the Quark, a motor capable of generating great power while weighing less than 30 kilograms (kg) created by Swedish firm Koenigsegg, whose difference with radial flux is that the magnetic field that produces the movement of the motor is parallel to the axis of rotation instead of perpendicular. Green Racing News has all the details.

• Blackbook Motorsport looks at the work that Bcomp and DHL are doing with respect to sustainability and motorsport. As stated in their article, The technical side of motorsport’s sustainability push, “I think that is also thanks to the power of motorsport because it is a breeding ground for technology. I think the industry as a whole is heading in the right direction as well.”

• The Green Racing Virtual Summit is back! The main leaders from the Motorsports, Auto and Mobility industries will gather on May 5th for another edition of the Green Racing Virtual Summit. Motorsports is bringing many innovations to help the global industry reach NetZero in the coming years, join participants to hear from the best experts in the field. You can register to take part here. I will be attending.

Getting to the Track Sustainably

• Formula E and Formula 1 partner DHL Express and Neste have announced a significant step towards decarbonising aviation logistics by expanding their existing cooperation with a new strategic collaboration. In the next five years, Neste will supply DHL with approximately 320,000 tonnes (400 million litres) of Neste MY Sustainable Aviation Fuel. The agreement is Neste’s largest for Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) to date and one of the largest SAF agreements in the aviation industry.

• Anglo American has successfully completed a sea trial using biofuel blended with very low sulphur fuel oil (VLSFO), reducing carbon emissions by approximately 10%. The trial further demonstrated the potential for sustainable biofuel to be used as a ‘drop-in’ fuel, improving its viability to help reduce emissions in the shipping sector. More details can be found here.