Sustainable Racing Utilising Solar Power

Abstract

Sustainable technologies are described for two racing types; solar racing, focussing on the World Solar Challenge (WSC), and Formula SAE-E (Society of Automotive Engineers-Electric). The former uses solar arrays on the body surface whilst the latter uses solar electricity generated in a renewable energy park and stored onboard in lithium polymer cells. The Aurora team (which has broken many records, including winning the WSC across Australia) is used to illustrate the importance of having low aerodynamic drag and frontal area, a highly efficient powertrain and low rolling resistance for “long circuit” racing. For short circuits such as FSAE Electric the R10E car from RMIT is described. The challenges of kinetic energy recovery systems (KERS) for racing are considered in order to emphasize the relative importance of different drive cycles.